"Hot Weather Moons"

I am amazed that Rose is not out of breath.  We have been rowing steadily for close to four hours without the aid of wind, and the air feels as thick and warm as blood.  My shirt is drenched from sweat and my hands feel raw against the rough-hewn wood of the oars.  Our yacht ran upon a hidden reef (near the intersection of coordinates 26°S and 61°E) and Rose and I have been rowing steadily south-southwest toward a line of unnamed (and, as far as I am able to ascertain, uninhabited) small islands, atolls, the windward edge of a sinking and ancient archipelago.  I’ve seen a number of shorebirds and within the last hour we’ve encountered an array of floating debris: branches, large, teardrop-shaped leaves, a hollowed-out coconut hull, silky and semitransparent flower petals.  “How much farther?” she asks; she doesn’t sound impatient – only curious.

I unfold my map and trace our curving arc down from the reef.  “We should reach land before midnight,” I say.  She smiles and turns and resumes her rowing.  I look out over her squared shoulders to the rectilinear powder-clouded horizon; the sun is poised on the watery western lip and suffuses the Indian Ocean’s waters with sparkling red light.  There is an uneven space on the horizon.  I stand and the skiff wobbles beneath me.  She looks up sharply.  “Land,” I say.  I point and she follows the tip of my finger.  She bows her head and says a brief word of prayer and then hoists the oar to her shoulder and begins to row again.

When we reach the placid lagoon waters, the moon has already risen up from the other side of the world and casts the island (a low atoll with a flare of white beach and a thick cluster of palms and scaveola trees that ring the lip of the estuary and cloak a low-rising promontory) in a muted dreamy bronze.  I can see the shapes of huts on the beach and cordoned manicured walkways that lead from a crude dock to the huts and further back into the treeshadows.  There is neither light nor sound, save the lapping of the waves on the sand and the far off hypnotic whoosh of the breakers.  We tie the skiff to the jetty.  When we reach the sand, Rose drops to her knees and clasps her hands and looks skyward.  “Thank you, O Lord, O Saviour, O merciful Jesus for delivering us from our travail just as you delivered all of mankind from theirs.  In Jesus’ name…”

            

“Amen,” I say, shaking my head.  She stands and walks towards me on unsteady legs.  We embrace in a flare of orange silent moonlight.  “Merry Christmas,” she says.  “Merry Christmas,” I say.  She rests her head on my shoulder.  The drowsy susurration of the breakwaters makes a lonely sound and I pull her closer to me.

            

“Hello!” I call.  There is no answer, not even an echo.  The air presses closer, salty and bloodwarm, and the island hangs in parturient suspension as if it were poised to answer.  I call again but this time don’t pause even to listen before I turn to Rose.  “It must be someone’s private atoll.  They probably left for the season.  It is monsoon season.”

            

“Yeah,” she says.

            

We unload our supplies from the bobbing skiff and put them in a neat pile at the head of the jetty.  We have: a three-gallon jug of water and a filter (with coffee filters to filter the salt), twenty-six freeze dried meals and perhaps thirty cans of assorted fruits and vegetables, a can-opener, a small stove with three spare propane tanks, two flashlights, a first aid kit (which includes aspirin and toiletries), two rain parkas, a lantern, a map, and three hundred waterproofed matches in a rusted tin.  

            

I light the lantern and follow the gravel pathway to the nearest hut.  It is a small one room dwelling with a thatched roof and a ring of windows on the far side.  There’s a bed in the corner, covered in a sheer tangle of mosquito netting, and a small table with a candle.  Rose shakes her head.  “How’s this for a shipwreck story?” she says.  “We end up on a resort island without even getting wet.”

It begins to rain shortly after we get everything into the cabin.  The rain falls straight down and makes a staccato sound on the roof.  I cook dinner in the doorway and we eat facing the lagoon.  Afterwards we lay down on the bed and I unfold the map.  

“If I’m right,” I say, “then we are here,” I point to a thin football-shaped island at coordinates 26.14°S and 60.95°E, “the first in a long chain of islands leading,” I check the directive, “roughly southwest to here,” I move my finger and point to a round, larger island, “Tromba Island – which may be inhabited.  And if not it is very near to a main shipping artery.”  I trace my finger in a long sweeping curve, traversing Reunion Island and up past Madagascar to the Seychelles.  “We should be alright.”

“Merry Christmas,” she says again and lies down.  I lie down next to her.  I am nearly asleep when she props herself onto an elbow.  “Does this cabin, or hut, whatever, does it smell funny to you?” she asks.  

“I concentrate on the smell.  I smell the immediate scents of salt and wood and cloth - and then something else, a sweet faintly cloying something that makes me uneasy.  “I dunno,” I say.  “Maybe a little.”

“Yeah,” she says.  “It smells bad in a way.”

The rain tapers off to a steady dripping and I eventually fall asleep.  Something wakes me and I lay for a long time, sore and disoriented, trying to determine what it was.  The rain and even the clouds have moved off and the doorsill is bright with orange moonlight.  I can see down to the waters of the lagoon where a streak of phosphorescence trails off to the open ocean.  

And then I hear, rising over the silence of the island, a low, loud inhuman moaning, a sound almost primatial in its timbre and intonation but utterly alien in its solemnity and desperation, a chilling, impossible sound, the noise of childhood nightmares.  

“Oh my God,” I say and clutch Rose and shake her.  “Oh my God,” I say.

“Hmmm,” Rose says.

“Rose, what was that?” I say.

She wakes up fully and looks at me with wide eyes.  “What…what’s going on?”

“Listen,” I say.

We listen for a long time but hear only the sound of the surf and the occasional dripping of the rain.  “What?” she asks.  

“I heard something moaning,” I say.  “It sounded just terrible.”  I am shaking.  She reaches over and takes me by the arm.  She tells me its okay but her wide apprehensive eyes tell me that she feels otherwise.

We lay for a long time listening.  I become more aware of the smell in the hut, that sweet nauseous odor barely perceptible beneath the salt and wood.  Rose falls asleep just before dawn and it begins to rain again, a sudden vertical deluge that drums hypnotically on the roof and lulls me to rest.

When I awake it is still raining.  Rose stands in the doorway, drinking from her decanter.  Beyond her I see huge cream - coloured clouds over the harbour, interspersed with patches of blue.  I hope that the rain will taper off and we’ll be able to make some progress down the archipelago.  I walk to the door and hug her from behind.  “Good morning,” I say.  “Did you sleep well?”

“Except for when you woke me up,” she says.  She is smiling.

“That was a horrid noise, whatever it was,” I say.  “It was probably just monkeys fighting.”

She laughs.  “Are there monkeys on an island this small?”

“Could be,” I say.

“How big is this place anyway?”

“According to the map, none of the islands in this chain are more than a mile wide in any direction.”

“Shall we explore it?”

“Well, I was hoping that if the rain let up we could explore a little by boat.”  I looked at the sky, the shapeless cloud-domes and the hollows of blue.  “You know, see how long it takes to get to the next island.  Who knows,” I gesture in the direction of the sea, “maybe we’ll even see a ship.”

We eat freeze-dried eggs and listen to the rain.  Rose reads from her dog-eared pocket Bible and I study the map; the rain does not let up.  By mid-afternoon the pockets of blue have been swallowed and the rain falls invariably straight and shows no sign of abating.

I decide to explore the island.  I tell Rose that I will climb to the top of the central foreland and see what I can see.  I ask her if she wants to go.  “Have fun,” she says without looking up.  I button my rain parka and cover my head with the hood.  “See if you can find something that looks like a Christmas tree,” she says.

I follow the gravel path into the scaveola trees; moss drifts like smoke through the gnarled branches as I climb, and the sound of the ocean disappears beneath the hiss of the rain.  It takes longer than I expected and when I finally break through the trees at the top of the promontory I am sweating and breathing hard.  An enormous mahogany tree marks the island’s highest point and I lean upon it as I look around.  The island is bigger than I had anticipated, but not by much.  Trees cover most of the central part of it and the thin lip of milky-white beach circumfuses all but the far southern tip, which is lost in trees and a jumble of craggy boulders.  I scan the horizon and see nothing but a low inscrutable veil of clouds.  I see no other signs of habitation save the small cluster of huts by the jetty.  

I decide that I’ll descend into the woods on the far side of the promontory, then walk to the beach and circle back around the other side of the island.  Again the sound of the ocean disappears when I enter the woods.  Other than the rain all is silence.  I find that I am on some sort of crude trail, not as defined as the walkways, but obviously used.  When the slope evens out another thin trail bisects it, heading east, and I follow it and walk into a tangle of large trees.  After a short time the path widens into a ring; the foliage has grown over the clearing and creates a low canopy that diminishes the light to dusk strength.  There are several boards strewn over the ground - which appears to have been very recently turned.  There are shapes drawn over these boards: jkjkjk; odd indecipherable comma shapes.  I stand for a moment watching my breath puff on the saturated air.  “Weird,” I say.  I turn and follow the trail back to the other and follow it to the beach.  

It takes me less than a half an hour to encircle the whole island.  When I return to the cabin Rose is sleeping.  I light the lantern and hang my dripping parka and unfold the map.  A sombre peal of thunder rolls overhead.  The lantern light dances on the walls.  I feel very warm and the light doubles and blurs; I lie down and immediately fall asleep.

When I awake it is dusk, the clouds so rain-heavy they seem to brush the tops of the trees.  I hear Rose’s steady breathing.  It seems that the smell, that distant sweet uneasy smell, has increased and I attribute it to the rain.  The windows over the bed are filled with gray light and I relight the lantern and set about making dinner.  I look out to the harbour but can hardly see past the jetty, where the boat rocks placidly on the waves; everything feels lonely and sad.  I pray that the rain will let up.  I look at Rose and wish that I had her imperturbable optimism.  I stand over her by the windows and look out at the dim evening.  

Movement catches my eye by the edge of woods.

“Rose,” I say.  “Rose!  There’s someone here.  Get up.”  She inhales sharply and mutters.  I feel my heartbeat rise.  I grip my pocketknife from the table and move to the door and grab my parka and head out into the rain.  Rose calls after me in a low, murmuring voice.  “Wait here,” I say.

I round the cabin and see that there are several men approaching through the rain-haze.  “Hello!” I call.  They don’t answer.  Rose is standing in the doorway.  “What is it?” she asks.

“Hello,” I call.  “I hope you don’t mind us…using your island but…”

The men continue moving towards me, onto the walkway now.  Something about their movement unnerves me; theirs is a slow, awkward stumbling shuffle, as though each of their individual limbs moves of its own independent volition.  I call again but there is no response.  “Wait,” I say to Rose and put my hand out as if to hold her back.  I walk towards the men.  There are more in the woods, all moving in that same clumsy way.  

I can see the first clearly through the dusk and haze now.  He is clad in tattered and colourless rags; I can’t see his face for his head hangs almost to his breast, lost in a filthy tangle of wet hair.  “Hello,” I say again.  And then I realize that none of the men (a rough estimate puts their number at around twenty) are making any sound whatsoever, other than the scuffing of their dragging feet.  “Hello.”  This time only a whisper.  I retreat a step.  Rose is still in the doorway.  I turn to her and motion towards the jetty.  

“Go to the boat,” I say.  I turn back to the men.  The first has lurched into the circle of huts and two more are close behind him.  I wonder where they were last night.  It rained all night and I explored the whole island and didn’t see any other buildings.  

Rose has not moved.  “Rose, go to the boat,” I say without looking back.  “Stop!” I shout to the men.  My hand tightens around my pocketknife.  “I don’t want any trouble.  Our ship ran aground and we had no other choice but to land here.”  Still the undeviating, hideous progress.  I retreat another step.  Rose still has not moved.  “Rose, get to the boat!”

The smell hits me then and I immediately double over and retch.  It is a damp sweetly sickening earthy smell; the smell of festering death in lightless places.  Rose moves to me and puts her hand on my back.  I stiffen.  

 “Rose, there’s something really not right about this.”

“No,” she says.  It is almost a question.  I look at her.  Her eyes are wide and dazed and inflectionless.

“Look at them,” I say.  I take her hand and try to pull her toward the boat.  The first of them is not more than ten metres away and the fetor is intolerable.  “See the way they…Rose, are you okay?”

“Yeah,” she says.  “They’re zombies.”

“Rose…that’s…” I try to say absurd but can’t.  I grab her hand and pull.  She comes easily enough but doesn’t take her eyes off of the approaching men.  “Goodbye,” she says and waves.  I realize that she is in shock.  I feel close to it myself.  

We make our way to the jetty.  My heart sinks when I see the boat: the hull is more than half filled with rainwater.  I jump into the boat and grab the dipper-bucket and begin to bail the water in earnest.  I hear a crash from our hut and see that one of the men has smashed the stove.  The first is again only ten metres away.  I help Rose into the flooded skiff (and grimace as it sinks almost to the lip of water) and untie the rope and push off with the oar just as the first man reaches the head of the dock.  I resume the bailing of water.  I give Rose the other oar but she doesn’t move.  She holds it across her lap and stares serenely back at the hut that is now filled with the roiling and silent mass.  The lead man reaches the end of the dock and stops; he doesn’t move again but simply stands, his face nearly on his breast beneath his rank and rotten hair.  And then he falls, face-first, into the water.  The others quickly follow suit.

I manage to put some distance between us and the jetty.  The rain soaks us and Rose begins to shiver.  I remove my parka and place it over her shoulders.   

“Rose.”

She doesn’t move.  I can’t think of anything to say.  I feel suddenly hopeless and terrified.  We are adrift in a monsoon storm without food or shelter or, I realize suddenly, a map.  I feel like crying.  The light has failed almost completely now.  I can see our hut, the lantern light spilling through the windows on the dark air, silhouetting the unwieldy shadows that move aimlessly about.

“We’ll stay by the shore,” I say, “but far enough out so that if they try to swim for us we can outdistance them.  If we get a chance we’ll grab our supplies and we’ll set off towards the next island.  Or maybe even to Tromba.”  Rose says nothing.  I slide the oar into the water and pull.  The huddle at the head of the jetty still stands motionless.  “They seem to be very slow.  I think we’ll be able to outrun them.”

Just then the cabin goes dark.  One of them must have broken the lantern.

“Yeah, they seem slow,” Rose says in her dreamy voice.  I wonder if she has ever fully returned to wakefulness.  “They are slow,” she says, and then giggles as though she has just told a joke.  This chills me.  I feel gooseflesh rise on my arms and back.

“Rose, are you okay?” I ask.  I reach out and touch her arm.  Her skin is very hot.  “Are you sick?”

“No, silly,” she says and giggles again.  

“You’re very hot,” I say.

“Very hot,” she says in her faraway voice.  Another giggle.

“Don’t worry.  We’ll get our things soon enough and then we’ll get warm and get something to eat.”

“One of those men came when you were gone,” she says.

I feel my stomach turn.  The world has gone wobbly.  “What?” I manage only a squeak.

“Yeah,” she says.  “I fell asleep and when I woke up one of those men was standing over the bed.”  Her voice swims with gentle distraction.  “He gave me this,” she says.  She shrugs out of the parka I had slung over her shoulders and lifts her shirt.  Her side is bleeding from what looks to be two rows of teeth marks.  The flesh between the rows is torn and swollen.  “He was mean,” she says.  “I stabbed him in the head with your knife and he…went…away.  It was because I prayed.”

“Oh…Oh Jesus,” I say.  “One of those…things” (I realize now that I can’t say ‘men’) “bit you?  And you didn’t tell me?”

“I think I’m going back to sleep,” she says.  “I feel…so…tired.”

“Rose!” I say.  “Don’t go to sleep.”  I shake her.  She blinks her eyes open but there is no spark in them.  “Good…night,” she says.  I can’t rouse her after that.  I pull the parka over her to shield her from the incessant downpour and commence imploring God for mercy.

*

I fall asleep and wake shivering in the rain.  Rose is standing over me, a dim blotchy shape on the rain darkness.  “Rose,” I say.  “Are you feeling better?”  She doesn’t answer.  

“Rose?”  I reach out my hand and touch her.  Her skin is cold.  “You’re…freezing,” I say.  “Let me wrap you in that parka.”

Rose raises her head and moans.  It is a sound that I’ve heard before, one I gladly attributed to fighting monkeys when the world still made sense. 

“Oh, Rose,” I whisper, and then her teeth are on my throat.