| Monday June 1st, 1936 The first of June, hurrah – and three weeks until I am Tailfast again! Once I have that locket around my neck as an official reminder, I am sure I will be able to keep up to its promise no matter what temptation comes my way. I had to tell Helen what happened with Lars on the beach, with her reaction being rather predictable. Having been grabbed yesterday for escort missions, I had no chance to see Jirry. Helen gritted her teeth and admitted that strictly speaking a girl only says “forsaking all others” the day she gets married, but that really is not what being Tailfast is about. She suggests I tell Saimmi the full facts before planning the trip to Sacred Island. Oh dear. Looking back on things, I have hardly been a shining example of devotion to Jirry; though he is the only one I like the idea of sharing a longhouse with. Unless I take him with me on all my adventures I will have to do a lot better about keeping things in check – dangerous Adventure seems to have such an effect on me, and I am training for a permanent career of it. Our tutors were taking a brief respite from coaching the third-years to pile on us some more useful experience – it must be handy for local businesses to know they can get free labour for the hard and messy jobs whenever a student has annoyed the staff. Molly and I were sent out all day with that new salvage boat, the aircraft-engined one that is getting a lot of use when the tourists are having fun learning to sail. Although the dangerous reefs are mostly far out surrounding Main and South Island, the main lagoon has an awful lot of sand banks just in the tidal range – many boats head out to anchor in what they think is open water, and discover they are fast aground by the time they finish the picnic hamper! Although it was jolly hard work, if Miss Devinski thinks this is a punishment for us she may have miscalculated. The tug is basically a wingless piece of flying boat on a flat-bottomed hull, with just the engines and fuel tanks on wing spars which also hold the outriggers keeping it stable. We were introduced to the Monpanoeha brothers who built it last summer, the three sea-otters having salvaged it and built the superstructure at Superior Engineering where they were apprentices. They handle most of the swimming, diving overboard to secure the rescued craft with towing hooks and hawsers. When the engines really open up it is definitely exhilarating and we can hit thirty knots inside half a minute – as an emergency salvage vessel it must be encouraging for the visitors to know that when they capsize in the central waters we can reach them from Casino Island in five minutes at most. There is an engineer’s seat on top of each engine to make servicing handy – although she was right in the prop blast Molly greatly enjoyed sitting astride the engine, whooping like a cowgirl as she kept a lookout for stranded yachts. Of course, by the end of the day we almost had to carry her off the boat as she was saddle-sore beyond belief after hours of straddling eight hundred horsepower, as well as being heavily perfumed of burned oil. But she took it all in her stride (a somewhat bow-legged stride by teatime, to be sure) and was keen for another go. It is fascinating to compare the tourist “sailors” with some of the old hands who are in and out of these islands all the time. We recognised one small vessel moored in Pirate’s Cove by its crew, an incredibly grizzled pipe-smoking skipper who looks like he could compete in the Olympics at wrist-wrestling, and his incredibly skinny lady-friend who looks as if she eats twice a year and sticks to salad even then. I think the other gentleman is their cook, a very rounded and whiskery individual who even carries a portable mincing machine at his belt for constantly making those “burger” things Molly is keen on immortalising in tinplate. No doubt Beryl would claim it is actually used in some exotic Oriental fighting style too hideous to translate. Our first-years have boat handling classes in the afternoon, and we are volunteered for helping supervise those as well. Interestingly, Liberty Morgenstern is far and away the best of them – Helen says New Haven is about as nautical a state as one can get, and with its political stance these days their national sport is blockade-running. Liberty has a lot to say about the robust virtues of naval life for organising the Proletariat, and (for a change) agrees with Tatiana when lovingly describing Bolshevist naval revolts before the Great War. It is somewhat like Ada and Maria agreeing that Moses was a fine fellow, as that happened before their theologies parted company. Of course, she remains as staunchly Red as ever and just last week was railing about Maria’s homeland and its “rampant imperialistic aristocracy”. As ever, Maria managed to sit on her quite decisively, with the one unanswerable fact that her Uncle’s father was a blacksmith and the family is quite as far from aristocracy as any Bolshevik could wish. I must say, Liberty has got a lot quieter recently. One gets the idea that initially she suspected the rather Spartan regime at Songmark was just a front for the cameras – we have not really heard why she was sent to this “playground for pampered parasites on the proletariat” as she used to put it. But by now even she has seen a distinct lack of pampering in the neighbourhood; possibly having poi served three meals in a row might have got the point across, or discovering the duty staff bungalow has the same model of (jolly hard) bed as our dormitory. As Maria often grumbles, it hardly matters if one does fall out of bed around here as it is just as comfortable on the floor. A thing to remind her of next time the rest of us are up at six and she needs crowbars and hydraulic jacks to prize her out! Definitely that is a dorm to watch out for, and not turn one’s back on. I often think the “Red dorm” as it is called by its mix of politics and fur colour, sometimes sets out to annoy people, and if they were awarded points for that our Tutors would put them top of the dorms. There is nothing in the Songmark rules either way about playing cards, but last week Liberty was loudly teaching Tatiana and the rest “Revolution Rummy” where one of the rules is to rapidly discard (“liquidate” as she says) all the Court Cards and get a winning hand of twos. Aces are thought to be elitist, it seems. At least I managed to point out that given the state of their respective nations, rather than the Proletarian twos it should realistically be the joker that ends up on top. One rather alarming thing on the way back: I found Adele sitting on the bench outside Songmark looking most unwell, with a rather dry nose and dull fur. Normally our Tutors would pick up on that right away, but as everyone knows they are keeping a very light eye on us second-years right now, what with the demands from our seniors and juniors being at its peak. I offered to help her to Mrs. Oelabe as she needs a thorough check-up – at which Adele looked quite panic-stricken and insisted she would be all right if I just helped her up to her dorm, but not to tell our Matron. I wish she would confide in someone – with her bad luck she needs all the help she can get, and having been landed in a dorm with Beryl and Missy K is just another misfortune. It makes me realise just how lucky I really am, to have such staunch friends with Helen, Molly and Maria. Going adventuring with Molly may put me in a few sticky situations, but if I was allergic to those I would have followed my chum Mabel to Switzerland for a respectable finishing-school! Wednesday June 3rd, 1936 Our Tutors are definitely still annoyed with us: there is a consignment of old engine blocks that Songmark has got from Superior Engineering for demonstrating mechanics to the first-years. All of these are from wrecks, and by the state some of them were in it is no surprise their aircraft crashed: if the engine is half an inch thick in baked-on oil residues the rest of the plane is hardly likely to be healthy. Guess who got the job of cleaning them? Actually, Molly has a few home recipes which do not feature in the books, and after a rapid raid on the supply sheds came up with a useful cocktail of petrol, acetone and carbon tetrachloride that definitely did the trick: I am sure her original Family business made worse mixes and sold it as whiskey. She found one appreciative audience if one can call it that: we had all the workshop doors wide open for the breeze to blow the fumes clear, and on hearing a loud thump behind us found our first-year Florence completely passed-out just from walking downwind of the sheds. I fear poor Florence will have to stick to gliders at this rate, as all it takes is someone opening a tin of metal polish in the room and one might as well have poured a pint of gin down her. It is awfully ironic given that she and her family are staunch teetotallers. Molly is mightily impressed by her weakness, and asked me to look out for any Native herb that had a tenth of that effect on people: she could have sold a million doses a day during Prohibition she says, and it would be the only way of making that American “near beer” remotely saleable. What in the military they call a Force Multiplier. Still, we had quite enough fresh air after lunch as we were farmed out to a familiar figure from last year, the local sculptor Mr. Tikitavi. Although mongeese are generally Indian like our chum Jasbir, the Spontoonies came from all directions in Plantation days and his folk have been here two generations. He did ask after Jasbir as we headed out to Main Island, and though he must be ten years older than her is very interested in hearing that she may dance at the Coconut Grove, despite our Tutors’ objections. Well, of course Jasbir is exceedingly pretty and an excellent dancer, probably better than us. Anyone can watch her in a show, though I should think Spontoon’s main theatre would start her as a backing dancer rather than the front row. I hardly liked to tell him that she is a Maharajah’s daughter, and could not possibly take an interest in him; it is absolutely Not Done. Although she comes from a Native State, she has awful social commitments at home and in just over a year has to return to Utterly Pradesh without any hint of scandal chasing her tail. Molly nudged me and whispered that Mongeese have quite a variety of fur patterns, and nobody feels too scandalised about what a dancer gets up to in her spare time – whether she is a mongoose girl who has dyed her fur or a half Siamese. This year is probably her last chance before returning to the searching gaze of her family, and she is not the only one. My ears blushed somewhat, and I quite took the point. I was saved from further embarrassment by our arriving at the site of the new sculpture on the North-Eastern tip of the island, past Beresby where we hunted the land-crabs. This is the last ridge of solid ground before it turns into the long, hook-tipped sand spit where we learn beach survival and foraging, and it has a wonderful view of open sea and skies. Definitely it is an imposing spot for a sculpture! It is one thing to put a Tiki in a Casino Island park where tourists can marvel at it between trips to bars and souvenir stalls, but to see it on the skyline raised up as a thirty-foot landmark makes a far more powerful statement. Just as in Europe many mountains are crowned with crosses, this Tiki sculpture shows to the world Spontoon’s vigorous cultural heritage, as it sits under the main air corridor for the central waters.  Like most of Mr. Tikitavi’s sculptures this is based on traditional designs and represents a local deity called “Tonnobe’wai’hapa” who is a rain-god. There are pictures of her carrying a vast bowl of water which she tilts out over the land as he sees fit: this statue is half finished but its main feature is the twenty-foot tilted bowl pointing to the North-Eastern horizon where the sun rises on the longest day. The great bowl is really very symbolic of the local religions, anchored firmly in the earth as it endlessly stares out into the empty seas and skies. Though some of the other Tikis we have seen have been carved from the living rock (an idea I understand rather better since starting to learn the local religion) the location and design of this one means he will have to use concrete. We were put to work on the shuttering, nailing it together as strong and watertight as a flying-boat hull, while other more skilled workers finished off the big bowl. It was explained that since most of the smaller versions of the statue are in the finest stone available, this one had to be of the finest concrete: indeed they were taking almost mathematical care to get the curve of the bowl exactly like that of the reference model, and hand-trowelling a very rich and fine-grained concrete mix for its surface.  Tatiana keeps saying that hard work never killed anyone. Possibly all those folk Ioseph Starling sent to Siberia die of unexpected tropical diseases, in that case. But although we worked non-stop to six in the evening, it was good honest exercise in the fresh air and we felt all the better for it. Actually, our Passes to work on the project said we were to stay as long as required, and by the time we had finished it was too late to get back to Songmark for the evening meal. If it is Poi, doubtless Missy K will not let ours go to waste. One thing they teach us that our Tutors would have to agree we have learned is how to take a problem and look for an opportunity inside. We retired to hand in the tools at a municipal depot in Main Village, and Mr. Tikitavi invited us to dine with his family. Quite a treat! Apart from the Hoele’toemis we have not seen the insides of many homes, and only a couple on Main Island. His is not Indian décor as I would have thought, but a rather milder version of Polynesian, and absolutely packed with very modern radio and sound equipment. Madelene X would need a towel round her muzzle to stop herself drooling on the circuits. He explained that he does a lot of work with Radio LONO and the film studios, presumably soundproofing their recording booths. Indeed, there were many photos of the wall of him with famous island bands. But one picture I saw looked rather odd, of him with a half dozen bat folk all wearing headphones. One would hardly have thought they needed them. I think he must have spotted me looking at that one in particular, as with a rather forced laugh he explained it had been an idea of his inspired by some problems a bat school friend was having. Modern cities are noisy places and bats’ ears are exquisitely sensitive; the headphones had been his idea of an equivalent to dark glasses to stop their senses being “dazzled”. If so, what were the wires from the headphones plugged into? Very odd. Still, he served us up a rather fine meal of local fish with tapioca “greens”, which is Molly’s favourite dish although it has been voted unpopular as poi by the more carnivorous of us at Songmark. That is an interesting one: apart from Molly, Adele, Maria and Irma, most of our year are carnivores. We have no bats though, as I suppose they find the noise and air blast of an open cockpit very troubling to the ears. Indeed, thinking about it I have only seen them here in the deep woods, far from noisy aircraft engines and the like. We met his family, which are two sisters and a younger brother who has just returned from University at Sealth City where he studied acoustics. As he pointed out, with all the filming done on these islands someone will want a proper sound stage before long. These islands really do have a jolly good long-term plan; it is one thing to hire out inexpensive local labourers to carry sets and the like, but they want their share of the skilled and well-paid parts of the film industry as well. Molly says the Hollywood film unions are screaming blue murder about it, but the local film co-operatives think rather differently and sponsor their best and brightest to take the best available courses even if they have to cross the Pacific to get them. Back to Songmark just before curfew, with only enough time to wash the lime and cement dust out of our fur before bed. Mr. Tikitavi’s workers all are obvious Spontoonie natives who have oiled fur and one can see why. Friday June 5th, 1936 Two more days of hard labour mixed in with our regular flying classes have definitely brought our fitness back up to Easter levels; if our Tutors really are punishing us it is hardly working, as we are relishing the fresh air outside the classrooms. A rather strange thing today: after her journalism class Maria brought in a report of a shipwreck off Tillamook, which is nothing so very special. The odd thing was that although fragments of lifeboats and other ship’s rescue gear had been washed ashore, there was no identifying marks on any of it – except for some empty ammunition boxes with German markings. That is what the report says at least, as although that was also the official language of Austro-Hungary, they have no registered merchant ships any more, and certainly no trade this far East. I would be feeling awful about it if that is the freighter I think it is – except that Mr. Sapohatan mentioned this in advance, and I very much doubt any of the crew went down with their ship. If things are as I suspect, a lot of unwanted evidence did go down with that ship but none of its cargo. Exactly where the cargo ended up, and what folk plan to do with a ship full of battleship shells that are so old that they would probably detonate in the gun when fired, is something I might find rather dangerous to know. Molly has been looking up old editions of Jane’s All The World’s Navies, and has been happily whispering to herself something about the never-completed Austro-Hungarian advanced “Viribis Unitis” class of battleship with 13.8 inch Skoda armament, a very non-standard calibre – exactly the sort of thing that might end up having shells forgotten about since 1918 in a Trieste warehouse. Still, we are looking forward to a relaxing weekend without too much first-year herding and then heading out on another trip on Monday. Exactly where we are going is a surprise; our Tutors just love to keep us guessing. Or as they say, we have learned enough theory already of the basics, and just need real practice to hammer it in. Our last lesson of the week was an interesting one over on Casino Island, at the offices of the Nimitz Union Mining Company. They have a small “museum” of specimens that we looked at initially with little interest – until folk pointed out some of the greatest fortunes have been made in prospecting. Everyone recognises gold, but around the world far more people have got rich on tin and copper, which one could pass by unless trained to spot them. There is definitely gold in New Guinea and many of the surrounding islands are barely explored still; at least we know what rocks to look for when approaching a potentially rich metal vein. Some of it is a long way from the old image of a grizzled miner with pickaxe and sifting pan, as we were showed the sort of equipment the Tanoaho family use to detect radium ores, a gold-leaf electroscope that loses its charge and the flimsy leaves droop when radio-activity is in the area. I should think that cellar of theirs can be detected clear across the street. Still, there are always advertisements in the newspapers for radium-enhanced health bracelets, corsets and suchlike, so no doubt it is good for one. Madelene X says there are constant scandals in France at all the hydrotherapy spas getting caught cheating by adding pitchblende ore to increase the radio-active effect of their waters before it is sent for public analysis. I did rather well in the metal ore prospecting tests by spotting intrusive rocks of the right kind, which was gneiss. Poor Adele scored bottom marks and picked up quite the wrong sort, a worthless lump of fused volcanic ash. Tuff. Saturday June 6th, 1936 Today was that rare thing recently, a perfectly normal Saturday. It felt very good to “recalibrate the instruments” as folk say, with a morning at our dance school and our old rivals of the S.I.T.H.S. now behaving themselves as we keep each other’s competitive edges sharp. Luncheon was as fine as ever at the Missing Coconut – and then we took a stroll back past the fuming enmities and fuming industrial plants of the two bio-reactors. We did not meet any of the owners, but saw one of the local engineers working on Professor Kurt’s site: it seems Molly is not the only one around here interested in new products. The usual end result of Professor Kurt’s process is rather like peat, and not unpleasant to the scent – but it is very bulky and the gardens take it by the cart and barrow load, which makes it rather unprofitable to carry far. He has a new project to continually re-ferment and concentrate it down to what folk are calling “vege-guano” which might be a considerable export money-spinner. Considering that in Grandfather’s time we found it worthwhile to import the original seabird product to England all the way from the Pacific, it has definite potential. Actually, the engineer whispered that the Althing was getting itchy about having a large installation full of hot, explosive ether vapour so near the expensive tourists and hotels, and using that site as a compost refinery would remove the risk to Main Island where there are more open spaces and the plantations are handy for truly large-scale production using their crop wastes. It is rather unfair: unlike his rival he gets his main site banished from Casino Island despite the fact it has not exploded even once. Doctor Maranowski’s methane plant is staying, despite its predecessor having redecorated half the city of Ulm one hot day in truly Biblical style. I recall reading of the rain of frogs in Scripture classes, but even that must have been less unpleasant than being on the downwind side of Ulm that day. The plague of flies which followed surely was another epic visitation. A very quiet afternoon, with the only odd thing being the number of police arriving on the water taxis and heading into Casino Island. When we returned to Songmark we found the reason: despite all the security features and awful warnings about the curse, someone this morning stole the famous Fire Crystal ruby from the Museum of Anthropomorphology! I remember Molly telling Beryl how totally impossible such a gem would be to dispose of, but someone seems to have decided acquiring it is the first priority. As to disposing of the loot, probably they expect to cross that fence when they come to it. Well, I know where Molly was all day, and Beryl came along to watch the dance lessons. So if the Police do the usual thing and seek out the usual suspects, I can give an honest alibi to two of them. Indeed, our Tutors did check with everyone returning as to where we had been today. Considering the lower two years alone have Molly, Beryl and Shin on the strength and that Songmark’s very first class did produce a complete dorm of very successful Pirates; one can hardly blame folk for asking. Molly says it could be worse, in some countries the police work entirely on commission – as the monks used to say, “confession is good for the soul.” Beryl was glibly explaining to some of the other first-years that Maria was quite right to be proud of her local cuisine: she then went into utterly plausible accounts of the lives of Marcus Borlotti and Claudio Canellini, two ancient Roman inventors without whom (she claimed) there would be no such thing as beans. She is really a fine story-teller, although she can distinguish fact from fiction perfectly well. The facts are whatever will profit her, and the fiction is “for export only.” Sunday June 7th, 1936 Dear Diary – life has a way of sneaking in unpleasant surprises from unexpected directions. Everything started off so well, with us crossing to South Island on a summer sea so smooth that Helen quite forgot to be sick. Saffina was with us and we met up at the Hoele’toemi family longhouse for our religious instructions. The morning was very pleasant and we certainly learned a lot – although there were some puzzling things, such as the Tiki statues on Main Island not really fitting their religious standard descriptions – although Saimmi explained that permission had been sought and granted to show them the way they had to be built. Very odd. Some of it was rather glaring, like seeing a statue of Buddha in a top hat. While Helen and Saffina finished cleaning one of the shrines, I took Saimmi aside under a tree and confessed to exactly what happened last week, with the fight on the Parsifal and the equally disturbing events afterwards, though I have no complaint at all to make against Lars. In fact he did very little, both Molly and I being very … unladylike with him. The Missionaries would doubtless complain. I had hoped for some guidance – and indeed I received it, and her personal forgiveness. Saimmi is of course a priestess as well as Jirry’s sister and she has strict laws to enforce which include approving of who can be Tailfast. Her personal forgiveness is just that, but she seemed rather disturbed by some parts of my account, not including our sinking two boatloads of people with no survivors. It was rather strange. She asked if I trusted her completely – to which I replied that I jolly well ought to, she being not only my religious instructor here but hopefully my sister-in-law! She put her paw to my forehead and asked me to make my mind as empty as I could – “see deepest in still waters” as she put it. I could have sworn I just blinked for a second, but next thing I knew the sun had moved round to the far side of the branch and Helen had appeared with Saffina. Saimmi was looking a little grim, and said she had to tell me I could not be Tailfast to Jirry this coming season. ! next |