Journey to the River Sea

  Miss Minton shrugged.

  ‘If you want something enough you usually get it. But you have to take what goes with it,’ – and she pointed to her shabby blouse and mended skirt. ‘Now, let’s see – what shall we start with? Ah yes, here is Bates – he must have sailed down this very river not sixty years ago. Look at that drawing of a sloth . . .’

  Chapter Four

  Mrs Carter was delighted to hear that Maia could not keep up with the twins. The first real smile they had seen on her lit up her flabby face and she gave permission readily enough for Maia to work on her own.

  ‘Of course, Beatrice and Gwendolyn are very intelligent, I’ve always known that.’ She gave Maia quite a kind look. ‘I daresay you’ll catch up soon enough if you apply yourself.’

  So each morning Maia was set to work on the veranda at a small wicker table. Miss Minton gave her exercises and projects and occasionally she left Dr Bullman and the twins to see if she needed help, but mostly Maia worked on her own and she loved it.

  She learnt about the explorers who had braved incredible hardship to map the rivers and mountains of Brazil, she copied the drawings made by the early naturalists: drawings of marmosets and tapirs and anacondas . . . and of the great trees which supplied the world with precious woods and rare medicines, and it was as though Miss Minton’s books gave her back the mysterious country she had longed to see, and which the Carters had shut out. She was told to write stories about whatever interested her; she learnt poetry by heart, and she wrote it.

  From time to time she would knock on the door of the dining room, where the twins were doing their lessons, and ask how to spell a word, choosing an easy one so that the girls could despise her . . .

  ‘How do you spell table?’ Maia would say, trying to sound worried, and Beatrice would tell her how to spell it, and say, ‘Goodness, can’t you even spell that?’

  But mostly no one took any notice of what Maia was doing. The teaching had been good at the Academy but Miss Minton was a born teacher. Not that Maia enjoyed all her lessons. Minty insisted on an hour of maths each day. She also made her go on learning Portuguese, and Maia was about to complain when she tried out a few words on the sullen maid, Tapi, and found that Tapi understood her, and almost smiled!

  It was because Miss Minton was determined that she should learn about the country that she lived in, that Maia had her first meeting with Mr Carter in his study.

  The girls were drawing a teapot according to the instructions of Dr Bullman, narrowing their round blue eyes as they measured the exact distance from the handle to the spout, when Miss Minton came to Maia and said, ‘It’s time you learnt to draw proper maps. Go and ask Mr Carter if there’s a chart or a map of the country surrounding his house.’

  Maia looked up, alarmed. She had scarcely spoken to Mr Carter who mostly sat silent and gloomy at meals and vanished as soon as he could.

  ‘Must I?’ asked Maia.

  ‘Yes,’ said Miss Minton, and returned to the twins. Mr Carter’s room was the end one in the main part of the house. As Maia knocked on the door she heard a shuffling and a rustling, as though papers were being quickly put away. Then he called, ‘Come in.’

  The room was dismal and dark like all the rooms in the house and the air was full of smoke from the cigarettes which hung from Mr Carter’s lower lip whenever he was alone. It was also dusty because he did not allow the maids to come in and clean. The charts and sales figures tacked to the wall had curling edges and looked as though they had been there for years; piles of paper lay in untidy heaps on the drawers and filing cabinets.

  But in the centre of Mr Carter’s desk was a cleared space covered in a white cloth, and on it were small, round objects which he was examining carefully through a lens. At first Maia thought they might be samples of rubber or specimens of soil, or seeds. But when she came closer she gave a little gasp.

  They were eyes.

  Glass eyes, but still definitely eyes. And not the eyes of dolls or teddy bears. No, these were human eyes – and so carefully made that it was hard to believe they were not real.

  The back of the eyes were hollowed like seashells to fit over the muscles of the person who had worn them, but the front was a perfectly copied ball. There were blue eyes and brown eyes and hazel eyes, and in the centre of the coloured part, a black pupil which looked as though it really must let in the light.

  ‘As you see, I am sorting my collection,’ said Mr Carter. He picked up one of the largest of the balls, criss-crossed with tiny scarlet veins, and held it to the light. ‘This is the left eye of the Duke of Wainford. He lost the real one in the Battle of Waterloo. It’s worth a pretty penny, I can tell you.’

  Maia swallowed. ‘How do you get hold of them?’

  ‘Oh, I have a man who sends them out from England. There’s quite a few dealers in the business. They get them from the undertakers as often as not – most people don’t mind too much what happens . . . afterwards.’ He put down the duke’s eye and picked up another one. ‘Now this one’s really special. It’s the right eye of a famous actress who was burnt in a fire in the theatre. Tilly Tyndall she was called. Look at the colour – it’s as blue as the sky, isn’t it? You wouldn’t believe what that would fetch. Of course the really valuable ones are the doubles, but they’re rare.’

  ‘You mean two eyes from the same person? From someone who’s lost both eyes?’

  Mr Carter nodded. ‘I’ve got three sets and they’re worth more than the rest put together.’ He put out a hand towards a blue velvet box, then changed his mind. The doubles were too valuable to show a child. ‘I tell you,’ said Mr Carter, ‘if this house went up in flames, it’s my collection I’d save.’

  ‘After you’d saved your wife and the twins,’ said Maia.

  He looked up sharply. ‘Eh? Yes. Yes of course; that goes without saying. Now, what was it you wanted?’

  ‘Miss Minton wondered whether you might have a map or a chart of the country round the house. It’s just to borrow for a little while.’

  Mr Carter sighed, but he got up and began to rummage in a number of drawers. ‘Here you are,’ he said, returning with a rolled-up chart. ‘It covers ten square miles behind the house. Bring it back.’

  Maia thanked him and left. She had never seen such a sad room or such a sad hobby.

  But the map was interesting. She took it to her room and waited till evening when Miss Minton came to do what she called ‘hearing Maia read’. Since Maia had read fluently since she was six years old, this mostly meant asking Maia what she thought of David Copperfield or arguing with her about sentimental poems which Maia liked, and Miss Minton didn’t.

  ‘Look – I’ve been trying to copy this, but it’s difficult. Would you believe there are so many little rivers and streams and channels behind the house?’

  Miss Minton bent to look. ‘They’re called igapes,’ she said, ‘and the Indians go up and down them in their canoes. Even the ones that seem to be choked with reeds are often navigable.’

  ‘It looks as though one could go to Manaus the back way – not down the main river, if one had a canoe.’

  ‘And if one knew the way,’ said Miss Minton, looking at the maze of little waterways.

  After she left, Maia again climbed onto the chair and looked out to the huts at the back. She had found out how to loosen the netting nailed over the window, and so could undo the catch. She knew the lullaby now that came from the middle hut where Tapi and Furo lived; sometimes she hummed it to herself in bed. And she was beginning to make out more and more people. The girl who had walked across the first night in her bright dress was called Conchita; her baby was a demon, always trying to wriggle out of her grasp, and the old lady in the middle hut who tended the chickens was Furo’s aunt . . .

  But ‘Blow the Wind Southerly’, the tune she had heard someone whistle on the first night, never came again.

  That Maia’s lessons were so interesting was a good thing because the twins went on being unfriendly and rude. Each
day when she saw them in the fresh white dresses which Tapi’s young sister washed and ironed in a small steamy hut beside the boat house, she felt hopeful. The fair girls, their pretty dresses, their pink and blue ribbons, seemed to belong to the twins she had imagined before she came.

  But the girls lived strange lives inside the dark and stuffy house.

  Like those pale insect grubs that exist only to be fed and groomed by others, the twins ordered the servants to comb their hair, pick up their handkerchiefs, iron their hair ribbons . . . They never went anywhere alone, following each other even to the bathroom, and when they shook their heads or nodded they moved absolutely together as though they were puppets pulled by the same string. Yet one did not get the feeling that they were particularly fond of each other – or indeed of anyone or anything else.

  As for Maia, the girls never lost a chance of snubbing her or making her feel unwanted. Mostly it was just words, but sometimes, when no one was there, they pushed her against the roughcast wall of the corridor, or dug their elbows into her. It was a long time since Maia had thought that Gwendolyn’s pinch that first day had been an accident.

  ‘Why do they hate me, Minty?’ she asked, bewildered. ‘What have I done to them?’

  And always Miss Minton answered, ‘They’re not used to other girls yet. Give them time.’

  Then at the beginning of the following week, they went into Manaus.

  ‘Perhaps Maia may prefer to stay behind and rest,’ suggested Mrs Carter hopefully.

  ‘Oh no. Please!’

  ‘Mr Murray has made it clear that Maia is to have dancing lessons and music lessons also,’ said Miss Minton firmly.

  Since the twins’ lessons were being paid for by the money Maia had brought, there was nothing Mrs Carter could do.

  They travelled down the Negro in the same dark green launch as had brought them from the ship. Mrs Carter and the twins sat in the cabin with the doors and windows shut, Maia and Miss Minton sat on deck.

  ‘Your hair’ll get all messy,’ said Beatrice.

  But Maia needed to feel the wind on her face. She felt as if she had been in prison for a week.

  Though they had docked there, Maia had not really seen the city. Now, as they drove from the harbour in a cab drawn by an old horse in a sunhat, she was amazed by the beauty and elegance of Manaus.

  They drove past mansions painted in every colour: pink and ochre and blue, with flowers tumbling from window boxes. In the gardens surrounding them were blossoming orange and lemon trees, and mangoes, and wonderful creepers climbing over the railings. They passed two churches, a museum, a little park with a bandstand and a children’s playground. Everywhere were busy people: black women carrying baskets on their heads, Indian women with babies on their hips, messenger boys, smartly dressed Europeans, and nuns ferrying lines of little children.

  And on the far side of a huge square, paved in swirling mosaics, stood a magnificent building roofed in tiles of green and gold, with the eagle of Brazil in precious stones soaring over the top.

  ‘Oh look!’ said Maia. ‘The theatre! Isn’t it beautiful! That’s where Clovis is going to act. The boy we met on the boat.’

  ‘We’re going there later to pick up our tickets,’ said Beatrice.

  ‘We’re going to see Little Lord Fauntleroy,’ said Gwendolyn.

  ‘Oh good!’ said Maia innocently. ‘That’s the play he’s got the lead in.’

  The twins looked at each other, but they said nothing then.

  They drove down a street of elegant shops: dress shops and shoe shops, saddlers and hat-makers. It was incredible, this luxury a thousand miles from the mouth of the river. There seemed to be everything here that one could find in Europe.

  The dress shops excited the twins; they leant out of the cab, peering and arguing.

  ‘Fleurette’s still got that polka dot muslin in the window. Can we go in, Mummy? You said we could shop properly this month. Can we have new dresses?’

  Mrs Carter nodded. She would be able to pay off the money she owed Fleurette. Well, not all of it; she owed money everywhere and Maia’s allowance would have to be doled out carefully. Fortunately Maia herself wouldn’t need new clothes for a long time. The child was dressed very plainly, she thought, looking at Maia’s blue poplin skirt and white blouse, but the materials were good.

  But first they stopped at Madame Duchamp’s Academy of Dance.

  Madame Duchamp was a French woman who had the wit to understand that the wealthy rubber growers and merchants who had come to Manaus wanted to make sure that their children missed nothing they could have had in Europe. So she ran classes in ballroom dancing, folk dancing, ballet . . .

  The class the twins went to was a mixed one for both boys and girls. There were children of all nationalities: Russian, English, French and, of course, Brazilian – some pure Portuguese, some of mixed race; Indian with Portuguese, black with Indian, for the people of Brazil had intermarried for centuries and were proud of their mixed blood.

  Maia changed quickly into her dancing shoes and turned round to see the twins sitting side by side on a locker, their plump legs sticking out in front, waiting for Miss Minton to come and help them.

  ‘Miss Porterhouse always put on our shoes and tied up our hair,’ said Beatrice.

  ‘So did Miss Chisholm,’ said Gwendolyn.

  Maia went ahead into the big room with its tall windows and barre. It was full of chattering, swirling children, waiting for Madame Duchamp. An old lady with mottled hands sat at the piano, absently touching the keys.

  A tall Russian boy with red hair came over and introduced himself. ‘I’m Sergei,’ he said with a friendly smile. ‘And this is my sister Olga.’

  Maia put out her hand. ‘I’m Maia. I’m staying with the Carters.’

  ‘Yes, we heard.’

  A sunny-looking Austrian girl with plaits around her head came to join them. This was Netta Haltmann, the daughter of the twins’ piano teacher. Maia was usually shy with new people, but the relief of seeing all these ordinary, welcoming children was overwhelming and she was soon chattering in the same mixture of languages that the other children used. She had not realized that every word she spoke to the twins had to be thought about and weighed.

  Madame Duchamp now entered; an elegant French woman of about fifty with a black bun skewered high on her head.

  ‘So, now we are ready. Find a space and point the toe, please.’

  Maia’s toe was already pointed. She loved to dance. The old woman at the piano began to play a Chopin waltz.

  While the children danced, the governesses and the nursemaids sat on chairs round the wall.

  ‘Is that the little cousin who comes to live with the Carters?’ said a friendly-looking, plump lady on Miss Minton’s left, and introduced herself. ‘I am Mademoiselle Lille, the governess of the Keminskys – Sergei and Olga.’

  ‘Yes, that’s Maia,’ said Miss Minton.

  ‘She is charming. So graceful.’

  ‘Yes, she is a good child,’ said Miss Minton.

  Mademoiselle Lille looked at her from under arched eyebrows. ‘And, of course, the twins,’ she added politely. ‘They are always so tidy . . . so clean . . .’

  Both women watched the two stolid girls, revolving as relentlessly as metronomes to the music.

  ‘Yes . . . it is difficult for them,’ said Miss Minton. ‘They have not been used to having other children.’

  ‘But now your Maia is happy,’ said Mademoiselle Lille who seemed to know a little too much about life at the Carters. ‘How musical she is! She and the little Netta and my Sergei also. You must bring her to visit us. The countess is always wanting that her children meet new friends.’

  The music stopped.

  ‘Now you will take partners,’ said Madame Duchamp.

  Maia looked down at the floor. There were more girls than boys; she would wait and dance with whoever was left over. A Portuguese boy with a rose in his buttonhole claimed Netta. Then she found that Sergei was at
her side.

  ‘Will you?’ he said. And she nodded happily, to see the twins watching her balefully before they turned to each other.

  ‘They always dance together,’ explained Sergei. ‘I don’t think they like other children.’

  Maia was not so sure. ‘Perhaps next time you can ask one of them.’

  ‘No! They make me frightened,’ he said, and laughed.

  It was a wonderful hour. The shabby old lady had played for the Imperial Russian Ballet School; she coaxed real music out of the battered piano. Maia forgot the twins, forgot the dark and gloomy house – and danced.

  But five minutes before the end of the lesson, something happened which changed her mood completely.

  Two men came into the room. They were dressed in black: black trousers, black jacket, black shoes, and as they walked over to Madame Duchamp, it was as though a pair of gloomy crows had stalked into the room.

  The larger of the crows put up his hand; the piano fell silent. Then both men approached Madame Duchamp and spoke to her in a low voice.

  Maia could not hear what they were saying but she felt a shiver of unease, and when she looked at Miss Minton, she saw that her governess was frowning.

  ‘I know nothing of such a boy,’ said Madame Duchamp firmly. ‘Nothing.’

  The men spoke again and when she nodded they turned to the class.

  ‘Now, please listen very carefully,’ said the taller of the crows, as though he was speaking to a group of two year olds. He had a square forehead and a bulbous nose covered in broken veins. ‘My name is Trapwood and my partner here is Mr Low, and we’ve come to Manaus on an important mission. A very important mission. We have come to find a boy who is living somewhere near here and who must be brought back to England.’

  Mr Low, the thinner, smaller crow, blinked his watery eyes and nodded. ‘Must be brought back,’ he repeated in a high voice. ‘Quickly. Must be taken back without delay.’

  ‘The boy is the son of an Englishman called Bernard Taverner who settled out here and who is now dead,’ Mr Trapwood went on. ‘He was drowned when his canoe overturned in the rapids. Now, does anyone here know such a boy?’