An exceedingly light breakfast, fruits and a bar apiece of tropical chocolate – then out in water-taxis past Casino Island, and round the northern spit of South Island that looks so much like one of the flukes of a two-mile anchor. We assembled on the West-facing beach while the water taxis held station offshore, ready to assist us if needed. Miss Pelton had a copy of the local tide table and a stopwatch – and set us off dorm by dorm, five minutes apart with a water-taxi assigned to watch each team. 

            We were off last for a change – the rules being that we all arrive together or abandon the attempt. Fortunately the current was warm, and we had been sent out at the calmest stage of the tide – with less than a mile to cross at the narrows, Maria calculated it as an hour’s easy swim. 

            Now we know why we were warned off trying it without a support boat! Though we set off in good style straight for the opposite shore – ten minutes later we were heading more or less into the depths of the Pacific, as the central Spontoon waters drained with the ebbing tide. Maria was all for turning straight for land – but with some difficulty I persuaded her to keep heading straight West, where it looked alarmingly as if we would miss the southern tip of the island entirely. 

            Another hour later we were nearing shore, the returning tide pulling us back North at about three knots – and no sign of the other dorms.  Still, with one’s snout just clear of the water it is impossible to see far, and we had worries of our own without thinking of the rest of our year. Definitely tiring, struggling against the current, but once we passed the southern “hook” of South Island we voted to keep on going. 

            After a hundred and thirty minutes we staggered onto a deserted shore in the shade of a sugar plantation and flopped like castaway jellyfish while the two water-taxi ladies cheered and pulled in to land. Apart from life-jackets, the water-taxi was stocked with a case of Nootnops Red, which we got through about half of before we landed at the meeting point of the Easternmost of the three Polynesian villages. Looking at the chart they carried, we covered about three miles in a great loop despite keeping our noses pointed the same direction – and none of us will ever underestimate the currents round here again. One assumes that several of the folk reported lost in “tragic swimming accidents” really did drown accidentally. 

            Hurrah! We were the first to cross the bay – Prudence’s team made it as did Jasbir’s, all the way through the currents. Madelene X ran out of steam before reaching the nearest shore, being picked up by the water taxi – and Missy K made a botch of the navigating, was caught in the main tidal race (five knots) and hit the shore about two miles away! 

            Memo to myself: look at the map for flying routes – but when getting one’s feet wet, a tidal chart is definitely required reading.
 

27^th June, 1935 

Busy preparing for the exams! These are mostly severely practical ones, from what our third-year friends tell us. Conchita recalls questions like measuring the distance across a river with a short length of rope and a compass – that sort of thing. 

            In fact, our Tutors are always marking us at random – this morning in the navigation class, Miss Wildford sat down on the floor, calmly announced she had broken both legs and asked Jasbir’s dorm exactly how they would get her down to the docks for evacuation.  They had to do it, too! She had “recovered” well enough after lunch to surprise us with having to rescue her during the swimming session. Unconscious or pretend-unconscious people are much harder to move than I had thought. 

            Still, every mark we get now is one less to do in the main exams at the end of next week – Helen’s whiskers are drooping at the prospect of written tests, something she truly hates. Her “education” was a severely practical one, and she says she would far rather carry Missy K in a fireman’s lift up Mount Kiribatori, than the three days of sitting and answering questions we are expecting. 

            Maria is already booked to go home, her Uncle’s air force have a carrier exercising somewhere off the Mixtexican coast that will be picking her up in the last week of term. And I still have no idea what I shall be doing – Molly will be going off on Maria’s flight, and changing at Cuba for the last leg home to Detroit. 

            With all this, there is also the SIRA association beginning their preparations for the August races. Of course, I hardly thought it would be just a matter of naming a day and having the flags ready – but the amount of work involved is quite staggering. The Daily Elele has a diary of the events scheduled – next week there is an “amateur hour” where any interested flyers test the course in whatever machines they have available (various aircraft classes are allowed. I would not have guessed there was a heavyweight commercial airliner race, till I saw that Dornier X practicing!) 

            Alas for poor Flying Flea #8, the salvageable remains of which (Father writes) was destroyed last week in a mystery fire! If I had shipped it over, I might have fixed floats on it and at least entered for the fun of it. Madelene X says I should have raced it against that floatplane GeeBee, under the “very silly” class. 

            Rather letting the side down for Madelene, I should have thought, seeing that the Flying Flea is a French breed in the first place. And she can hardly complain about silly designs – on the newsreels we have all seen those French “monowheel” motorcycle racers where the driver and engine sit inside one big wheel like a convict in a treadmill, and now there is one of them rocking and swaying around Casino Island, much to her delight. Its owner is a Parisian, who is loud in its praises and full of predictions that it will be the transport revolution of the future. 

            Madelene begged a ride alongside the intrepid owner, and indeed it handled the roads quite well, despite what looked like an alarming swaying motion at every touch of the brake or throttle. Either it will be a transport revolution, or at least a useful test device should anyone ever wish a seasickness simulator.

29^th June, 1935 

A local post parcel for Molly arrived today – I poked my snout round our dorm door to see her sliding herself into an obvious Rachorska dress, a decidedly – sophisticated one, mostly black silk. Molly certainly looked very stylish in it – and though there was no note, only a single white rose, I have no doubt whom it is from. The really disturbing thing is, it fits like a glove – our shapes have changed somewhat since our only official fitting by the Countess, and this is more up-to-date. 

            Helen’s comment was that when a young lady puts on that sort of present, it is usually from someone who plans to take it off her (I paraphrase. Helen is a little rough in speech still sometimes.) Molly just stuck her snout in the air and announced Lars was very welcome to. (I paraphrase still more. Molly is sometimes quite unbearably crude. You might think the wines and spirits trade could afford some more enlightened education.) 

            Helen has been making some creditable attempts to discourage Molly, but her more direct approach has fared no better than mine has. Even when Helen pointed out her probable fate had I not rescued her, Molly countered that Lars had plenty of other occasions had he wanted to make off with her – and anyway, even if true it would have been “just business” before he got to know her better. 

            When Molly says something is “just business” she is generally reminiscing of her life back home when various of her family’s business rivals had unfortunate accidents that put them out of business – spirit warehouses catching fire, odd accidents with tonnes of war-surplus chlorine and the like. 

           Indeed, she countered that anyone who thought she had reasons to hold a grudge against him, would hardly be giving her ammunition. But everyone in Mr. Nordstrom’s profession already has all the weaponry they need (he has mentioned to her his rivalry with Berckhardts’ establishment) and he presumably has ways of stopping them being able to use it. 

            Helen gave up at last, and predicted she would end up writing to Molly c/o some house of ill repute in Macao. At least one of us is very wrong about Mr. Lars Nordstrom, but I will not be going near enough to personally find out!

            Off again to the dance school along with Jasbir’s dorm, as we take part in some large-scale exercises with our whole dance class. Our spare-time exercising is paying off, as we are able to get through even the most strenuous dance routines without much difficulty. I recall back in November, we would finish our Saturday sessions weak at the knees and staggering back to the water taxi; now we step through them having already started the day with two hours on the running track and an hour’s self-defence class. Maria has got hold of what she says is an advanced exercise handbook – but she refuses to let Molly see it, and neither Helen or myself speak any Italian (we are fairly certain it is nothing but an infantry training manual.) 

            Still, I am head of this dorm, and Maria will not be shouting unnecessary orders or making us carry loads round the track. No names, no pack-drill.
 

30^th June, 1935 

A relaxing Sunday, beginning as ever with our self-defence class. Beryl is demonstrating advanced hockey moves that can be adapted to work improvising with branches – for an hour the open longhouse resembled a Robin Hood film set with quarterstaffs flying. Beryl is really quite enthusiastic about self-defence – at her old school they “learn you all the tricks” as she inelegantly puts it. 

            It seems that although at St. T’s the junior years are indeed a savage free-for-all of unkempt mobs battling it out – in the senior year there is a definite mellowing, or at least a change in direction as those who have come through with ears and tail et cetera intact, suddenly decide to be debutantes. Or that was the general impression, though Beryl put it very differently. At any rate, Beryl has been looking at our evening dresses somewhat hungrily – happily for us, none of them would fit her size and species, or we would definitely have to lock the wardrobe. 

            One would never have thought that Molly could get tired of her Sunday excursions over to Moon Island to the rifle range – but the “hot” ammunition for my T-Gew rifle is long gone, and Beryl is quite persuasive. At any rate, the two of them headed out to the Temple of Sacred Reward, for Molly to look around. 

            I have asked Miss Devinski about their odd Temple, which she assures me through rather gritted teeth, is officially registered as a Church. But it is owned by Mr. Van Hoogstraaten Senior, who seems to have invented it from scratch. Possibly it is one of those Mystery Religions, where one must rise to be their version of Archbishop before being revealed what they are really doing. 

            I think I can do better, myself – having not one but two perfectly genuine churches to attend. The Rev. Bingham is on holiday this month – some of the parishioners were commenting that he could certainly use a rest.  Still – the sermon seemed definitely dull without him, and Helen and myself were very keen to see what Saimmi had to show us. 

            We were certainly not disappointed – having already seen the Natives of No Island last week, we learned for the first time something of their history and religion. It seems that they have been here all along, even when the Spontoon group was deserted of all its original Pacific Islander inhabitants. When the next wave of settlers started to become “Spontoonies”, they made contact with the Polynesians amongst them and very slowly let others into the secret. 

            From what Saimmi tells us, Sacred Island was the meeting-place for long centuries before any land-dwellers ever arrived on these islands – it seems there is something about its underwater shape that is of particular significance for them. The temple with the aisle of Tikis is by far the oldest building on the island, and linked to the events that (amongst other things) prevented coconuts growing in these islands. 

            I asked about that, but Saimmi smiled and noted that it is quite another story, and one we will know the full facts of only if we enter the inner part of the religion. Quite a shock, as with meeting the oceanic community, I was sure that was the big secret!
 

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