Journey to the River Sea

After that she slipped in to see them whenever she could. The old lady, who was Furo’s aunt, taught her other songs: songs that the African slaves had brought over when they came to work in the sugar plantations; songs she had learnt from her Portuguese employers when she was a nursemaid in Manaus. They showed her the end hut, the one where the rubber-gatherers had slept, but which was now empty, because the men had slipped back into the forest when Mr Carter hadn’t paid them for three whole months.

But nobody knew the North Country tune she had heard whistled on the first day, nor could they tell her anything about the Indian boy who had taken her to Manaus. There were many such boys on the river, they said, and Maia began to feel that she would never see her rescuer again.

Several days had passed since the disaster of the matinée and in the Hotel Paradiso things were going badly. The Goodleys had called a meeting in their bedroom to decide what to do, but as usual they started by nagging Clovis.

‘You’d think you could have waited another week before you started honking like an old grandfather,’ said Mrs Goodley.

‘You realize you’ve turned us into a laughing stock,’ said Nancy Goodley. ‘After all we’ve done for you, making you into a star.’

Clovis hung his head. He was crouched on a dirty footstool, clutching his stomach which was heaving after the Paradiso breakfast of bean stew and fish bones, and he was covered in bites because the hotel sheets were crawling with bedbugs.

It was all his fault, he knew that – and now even more things were going wrong. A banana boat had come in from Belem the night before and the captain had told the manager of the Paradiso that the company had left there without paying their hotel bill. Since then the manager shot out of his office whenever any of the actors came past, asking for money and threatening to take their clothes and belongings if they didn’t pay.

They had tried to put on a funny play that Mr Goodley had written instead of Fauntleroy, but it wasn’t funny and had to be pulled out, and now not only the hotel but the theatre was losing money, and the management was threatening to cancel the second week of their booking.

They were due to go on to Columbia and Peru – but how?

‘Perhaps we could steal out of the hotel one by one at night, and hire a lorry?’ suggested the old actor with the flashing teeth.

‘Hire a lorry with what?’ sneered Mr Goodley. ‘Pebbles? Coconut shells?’

Clovis stopped listening. He felt as wretched as he had ever done, and frightened too. What was going to happen to him and to everyone? He could see himself staring into the dark pit of the theatre and listening to that awful tittering that had started everyone off. Two girls, high-pitched and cruel. One thing was certain, no one was going to get him onto a stage again.

Only Maia was still his friend. She’d promised to help him; she’d said there was something they could do – and he trusted Maia as he trusted no one else. The loud, angry voices crashed over his head. The room was sweltering; a centipede fell from the ceiling at his feet. Downstairs, someone opened a door and the smell of the dreaded bean stew came up and hit him. He couldn’t face it again. He couldn’t face any of it...

Then suddenly he sat up very straight. He didn’t have to face it, now that he wasn’t acting any more. He knew where Maia lived, and Miss Minton – a few miles up the river to the north. The twins would like to see him, Maia had said on the boat; and Clovis saw them now, welcoming and kind.

Yes, that’s what he’d do. He’d go and find Maia. He had a few coins still, someone would take him up the river. And once he was with Maia and Miss Minton everything would be all right. They would help him to get home. Maia and Miss Minton together could do anything.

Miss Minton’s afternoon off fell two days later. She was going into Manaus and Maia hoped she would ask her to go with her, but she didn’t. She was going to see if there was a reply yet from Mr Murray, but after that she had business to attend to, she said. Since the Carters were going into the town to visit the only family in Manaus with whom they were still on speaking terms, they could hardly help offering her a place in the launch.

‘Where is Furo?’ asked Mrs Carter, as one of the other Indians waited by the boat.

‘Sick,’ said the man, letting his knees go soft and miming a fever.

‘Oh, really they are impossible, these people,’ said Mrs Carter angrily. ‘The slightest thing and they stay off work.’

Maia waved them off. Then she went into the sitting room and opened the piano. It was almost impossible to practise when the Carters were at home. She started on her scales, her arpeggios, but sooner than she should have done she began to play the Chopin Ballade she had been learning in London. She was so absorbed that at first she did not see Furo beckoning to her outside the window.

He did not seem to be in the least sick. He looked in fact rather pleased and excited.