Spontoon Island
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Extracts from a Diary
by Amelia Bourne-Phipps
-edited by Simon Barber-
15 January, 1936 to 20 January, 1936

Monday 15th January, 1936

A rapid bustling over to Casino Island, where we were poked and prodded and swabbed by the medics – who agreed that we would be feeling ill by now if we had carried back anything unpleasant from Vostok (where the Government are accusing the Reds of sabotaging the water supply) and were warned off from handling any food for other people just in case. Still, we used the trip to get our term’s Medical Certificate that everyone else got last week. With all the spots on the globe Songmark girls start from and travel to on the way here, it is definitely needed. We are told that our Certificates are held as a public record while we are here – a sensible notion, if anyone wishes to hire a chef or nurse they can be certain of good health.

Back to classes after lunch, with a vengeance. The good thing is that we have plenty of flying hours scheduled this term – and indeed I demonstrated my little Sand Flea to the first-years. I am rather glad it was not Flying Flea #3, whose two-stroke engine was rather too recognisable as once having graced a lawn-mower and burned about a quarter as much oil as petrol. It would have made a useful sky-writing aircraft, except those are meant to be able to shut the smoke trail off. Today though, I logged another hour on the Sand Flea, all written up in my logbook next to the solo hours I put in on a Balalaika. That was a very different experience, the Balalaika being more like piloting a large boat through the water, and none too keen on snap rolls or Immelman turns. Although nothing like as aerobatic as the high-performance Sea Fleas we saw last Easter, my own little craft is really rather sprightly.

This term we study for our official Pilot’s exam – all being well, before Easter I will be at the nearest Empire Training School down in the Sullivan Islands (the chain next to the Gilbert Isles) to be examined for my "B" license. Molly and Helen might have to go all the way to Vanilla Field in Manila, if they want an American equivalent. I have heard good things about the flying schools in Manila – far from just ticking in the legally required boxes, they let their advanced students really "push the envelope". I really don’t know where Maria wants to take her test; the nearest Italian air base is in East Africa!

At the self-defence classes today, we were being put through our paces with broom-handles as quarterstaffs. They might not be the most effective weapon, but in skilled paws really quite useful, as a dozen Robin Hood films have shown the world. Unlike many such things, they are easily obtained anywhere and one can carry a brush straight past a policeman without being questioned – and our instructor invited any three of us to try and take it off her. Although she definitely pulled her punches, Molly, Beryl and Irma Bundt are nursing bruises as witness what a practiced brush-wielder can do. We will never walk past a cleaner in the corridors again in quite the same way.

Molly really should have learned by now not to try and up-stage people until she knows what they are capable of. She proudly produced her Cossack souvenir and announced it was much better. Our instructor mildly agreed, and pushed one of the broom handles (an inch and a quarter thickness of seasoned hardwood) well into the ground. Accepting Molly’s knout, she gave in a wide swing and actually cracked it like a circus ringmaster’s whip – the steel tip cutting the broom handle clean in two! Smiling, she handled it back to Molly with the one word – "Practise."

Wednesday 16 th January, 1936

Hurrah! We received our clean bills of health today, having been found free of anything unpleasant (except Molly’s slight case of Athlete’s paw – those high leather Russian boots she now wears are rather stifling) and are free to take jobs at any Popatohi food stall in the islands should we care to. A restful sort of career, by all accounts.

Actually, the chance would be a fine thing – our timetables are booked solid all week, and the most "resting" we do is on water-taxis between heading out to courses on Casino Island. I am happy just to flop down for five minutes, but real swots such as Prudence and Susan de Ruiz take their notes along to study en route. Adele’s textbook blew overboard. Apart from my dorm and Prudence’s, I don’t think any of us really know enough Spontoonie to chat with the water-taxi folk. The taxi folk do speak English, rather better than most tourists guess, but do not gossip in it.

Helen has her doubts about them, but on everyday subjects they are certainly a mine of information and not at all close-mouthed in their own language. Today everyone is talking about the sensational arrests made by their chief Detective, Inspector Stagg who has managed to shut down another smuggling gang (netting half a million shell’s worth of contraband and, oddly enough, a consignment of old English mill stones.). I was relaying some of the details to the first-year class we were escorting, when I saw Liberty Morgenstern go a peculiar colour as if she was about to be seasick.
I keep forgetting that many of our first-years do not read the "Daily Elele" and miss out on a lot of local news. I remembered reading about Inspector Stagg coming from New Haven, but had not put two and two together – Liberty must be delighted to see she has a fellow countryman here. It’s a small world, in these seaplane days!

By contrast, Beryl is an absolute mine of misinformation. We arrived back before teatime to see her at work on one of our regular chores, feeding the security bigdogs. I noticed the gaggle of first-years listening to her with hushed voices and shocked expressions, as Beryl fed the hounds and blithely explained the origins of three of them. According to Beryl, she had the story off one of the local cooks who was there at the time when a canine lady thief broke into the Songmark compound trying to steal the payroll. Everything was hushed up afterwards, she says, and nobody will ever admit what happened. I have to admit, Beryl can spin a convincing yarn – the more people deny it the truer it will seem that it really was hushed up. Although – I must say, it is true that three of the guard dogs are of the right age and ARE noticeably more intelligent than the rest.

Friday 18 th January, 1936

A record week, I have put twenty hours flight time in my logbook, four of them in my own aircraft. I had been dreading returning to find Beryl had "borrowed" it for one of her schemes, and either crashed it or had it seized by the Police. Possibly dear Sand Flea 1 was saved by having almost no cargo or passenger capacity, and being able to only reach Orpington Island even with a pilot of Beryl’s size. I dread to think what would have happened in her paws if it had the range to make the run to Krupmark.

Thinking of that unpleasant place, it seems Songmark now lists a new student from there! One of the first-years is a most distinctive ring-tailed girl of obvious Oriental stock, who only joined us this term. I can hardly imagine what the entry requirements to do that must be, considering our Tutors are absolutely twitchy about the prospect of failing any of us. Songmark has never failed to graduate a student yet after the full three years (though some have dropped out before completing) but we are often told that they will if they have to.

The school’s Reputation is its greatest asset, and they will do anything to preserve it; rather like back home at Oxbridge, where by repute any academic suspected of (say) selling exam papers gets invited out to a country house weekend and makes a useful victim for the local amateur detectives to investigate. It would be as socially unthinkable to invite a houseful of guests over and not provide them with food, as it would be not to provide them with a murder mystery. Simply not done.
Anyway, Wo Shin seems a quiet enough girl; at least we have not had to break up any fights yet. Considering that one of the dorms in Songmark’s very first year of graduates started off as very respectable and are now the Air-Pirate scourge of the South China Sea, it might well be that someone who regards Krupmark Island as a nice place to live, can become respectable. At least, we live in hope.

Of the various first-years we are escorting around, Tatiana looks the most "driven", especially after she had that interview at her Embassy last week. Although as she is still here it obviously went better than it might have, one gets the impression she was sternly "called to the carpet" and told to do much better next time.

Saturday 19 th January, 1936

A damp day indeed – we awoke to the hammering of torrential rain on the roof with no real inclination to race out to Casino Island on the first available water-taxi. In fact, we only just arrived in time for our dance classes – a fine though exceedingly strenuous hula with twenty of us taking part, and lasting well into the middle of the afternoon.

Having all day, we were just about to relax with a matinee ("Road to Ry’leh" with Bob Hype, "Wing" Crosby and Dorothy Llama) when Susan de Ruiz trotted past and hailed us. Duty calls. We have all-day Passes to Casino Island, but the first-years have not – and of all people, Tatiana has gone over the wall and was traced to a water-taxi heading this way. It is most annoying.
Our matinee had to be abandoned as we split up and searched, getting wet to the skin and more irritable by the minute. The usual locations drew a blank – and indeed, Tatiana is not the type to break the rules for the sake of a flagon of Nootnops Blue or better meals than they serve at weekends at Songmark when half the cooks are away.

An hour later, I happened to spot Prudence and Tahni heading towards the Main Island water taxi dock arm-in arm and clearly not running search-patterns for any Missing Red Miss. I was about to remind Prudence of her Second-year duty to search when she casually mentioned she had seen Tatiana five minutes earlier, and indeed she had been at the Double Lotus all afternoon.

If someone had told me Tatiana had been at the Vostok Ambassador’s birthday party, I could hardly have been more amazed – I think my fur must have looked like a porcupine, standing out in shock even though I was soaked to the skin. I thanked Prudence and jogged straight over to that inconspicuous venue – there is a rather large lady doorman there on weekends, but rather than throwing me out like a drowned rat she gave me a smile and a large towel, even offering to help rub me dry. One can hardly deny it is a friendly place. She would have taken all day over her task had I not excused myself as soon as I ceased to actually drip on their carpets.

Duty calls – I must have looked rather grim and ruffled as I strode in, still somewhat damp. Tatiana certainly was there, sitting at one corner of the elegant bar with her ears right down and her tail bottled out like a flue-brush – I have seen her very cool when surrounded by heavily armed and highly homicidal Pelmeni, but here she looked like a goldfish thrown into a shark pit. There must have been a dozen other ladies there, all minding their business (and that of their friends) but nothing at all indecorous. It is quite a genteel place all round, with the same décor as last time but freshly repainted – lotus blossoms entwined in various ways, all perfectly botanical.

I was wondering what the correct etiquette was about frog-marching someone out of an establishment discreetly, but Tatiana saw me like a drowning sailor sees a life-raft, and rocketed towards me causing good-humoured chaff from some of the regulars. I did frog-march her down to the water taxi with her arm behind her back, in no mood to listen to explanations – it was already getting dark by then, and she had wasted our afternoon for us. Actually she was in no mood to resist, though she was babbling incoherently about "decadence" and such things. Honestly, the door was open to leave at any time, and I confess to having no sympathy for her.

(Later) We had handed Tatiana over to await our Tutors’ displeasure and were sitting down to an extra-healthy but extra-gloomy meal of three-finger Poi, when Beryl bounced in scented of healthy rat musk and Nootnops Blue. She was in an expansive mood – and let slip one little detail. Tatiana had asked her in confidence if there were any secret meeting-places of the locals that she could investigate, no doubt thinking of political clubs and "cafes" such as European parties form in when they are not partying in beer-cellars.

Beryl innocently told her that she did know of one, where she might find out an awful lot she never knew before – very true in its way no doubt, and very "Beryl" for you.

Sunday 20 th January, 1936

One can quite understand why the filming season only begins here in March – for two days it has rained so hard we can hardly see across the Songmark compound. Off again to South Island, wishing we had oiled fur again (Helen having been nicely waterproofed for three weeks in the holidays) as our standard oilskins are really not up to scratch. The water between the islands was very calm, almost as if it was hammered flat by the rain, and Helen was not seasick even once.
Saimmi was not around, being called off to Main Island – but her sister Moeli was, and greeted us very happily from the family longhouse. She was in traditional costume as ever, with only a grass skirt and a straw hat keeping the rain off, but seemed perfectly comfortable. Jirry and Marti were both away today, probably on that "waterworks project" that makes its best progress when there are no tourists around. It was an educational day as ever, as Moeli pointed out with pride some of the markings combed into her fur – or rather, some significant variations on the standard ones declaring her status. None of these are compulsory to wear of course, but any fur markings one does wear must be accurate. For us to wear some of them would be like wandering through Aldershot with forged medal ribbons on – absolutely not done.

Commenting that we could hardly get wetter whatever happened, Moeli invited us for a swim. The Spontoonies swim all year round, and indeed even the January water temperature here is no worse than midsummer back Home. We followed her through the narrow trails to the uninhabited Western side of the island, where the land slopes steeply down with nowhere to anchor a canoe – Main Island was quite hidden by the sheets of rain, and this time of year there is very little shipping in the channel.

Our friend waded out to waist-deep and started to slap the water in that peculiar rhythm she has always refused to teach us so far, and then we waited. Four or five minutes later a head broke the surface cautiously – a casual viewer might have thought it was just a pearl-diver coming up for air, but we guessed otherwise.

I had not met the "Natives of no island" since the Summer Solstice festivals, but some of them remembered me by name. Helen whispered she had met them twice during the holidays, once before she was officially Tailfast to Marti – and now she knows why Moeli is perfectly happy with her choice. They mentioned having seen me swimming off Eastern Island on last week’s practice dives; I had no idea we were being observed. The idea of them watching all swimmers from below is a little disturbing, and might explain a few of the "tragic swimming accidents" that happen to deserving enemies around here.

We had a very interesting morning’s swim, although they were clearly humouring us, like swallows darting around a lumbering turkey. The underwater Nature films one sees of fishes darting away at incredible speed are equally true of them – for sheer power, stamina and reflex speed I doubt any land-dweller can begin to come close. Helen and I are as fit as we have ever been, but we felt like wooden-legged veterans trying to keep up with Olympic athletes. Moeli’s husband and cub were not there, today they are fishing off the far side of Main Island we were told, but we played a ball game with the other kittens using a giant sponge where they proved their reflexes must be easily four times faster than ours. Just think what they could do if they were not restricted to the water! If they ever revealed themselves to the outside world, I would bet my last cowry on Spontoon winning the water-polo at this year’s Berlin Olympics.

By mid-afternoon we were quite worn out, and waved farewell as we staggered up the beach to don our grass skirts again. A slow walk back to the Hoele’toemi household and a very nourishing and welcome meal, then back across the island in the dusk to the ferry and Songmark.

We had another run-in with Madelene X as soon as we returned, still clad in our (respectable) Native costumes. Our Songmark shorts and shirts were in our packs, as we saw no point in getting them soaking wet for the sake of half an hour on water taxis and dripping our way up from the docks. True enough, we are not meant to wear Native costume around Eastern Island – but what really irked her is that it was on a Sunday, when she insists we should have been in Church.

Honestly, the Church is not going to go out of business for the want of our custom. As to her complaint of us "losing our Beliefs", we are actually gaining a lot more. The only faith I have recently lost that I know of, is my remaining belief in "What you don’t know can’t hurt you" – and if she wants to complain about that one, I think I can point her to our Tutors to argue the point with them.

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