Nation

She sang sixteen verses, counting all the time, singing to the beer as it bubbled, and noted when it was suddenly as clear and sparkly as a diamond. Then she tested her conclusion, like a proper scientist would, on another bowl of mother-of-beer, feeling rather certain and more than a little pleased with herself. Now she had a working hypothesis.

“Baa, baa, black — ”

She stopped, aware of people trying to be quiet. Cahle and the Unknown Woman were standing in the doorway, listening with interest.

“Men! ” said Cahle cheerfully. She had a flower tucked in her hair.

“Er… what? ” said Daphne, flustered.

“I want to go and see my husbun! ”

Daphne understood that, and there was no rule against it. Men weren’t allowed into the Place, but women could come and go as they pleased.

“Er… good, ” she said. She felt something touch her hair, went to brush it away, and realized that the Unknown Woman was undoing her plaits. She went to stop her and caught Cahle’s warning look. In her head the Unknown Woman was coming back from somewhere bad, and every sign of her being a normal person again was to be encouraged.

She felt the plaits being gently teased apart.

Then she smelled a whiff of perfume, and realized the woman had stuck a flower behind her ear. They grew everywhere in the Place, huge floppy pink and purple blooms that knocked you down with their scent. Cahle generally wound one into her hair in the evenings.

“Er, thank you, ” she said.

Cahle took her gently by the arm, and Daphne felt the panic rise. She was going to the beach as well? But she was practically naked! She had nothing under the grass skirt but one petticoat, her pantaloons, and a pair of Unmentionables! And her feet were bare right up to the ankles!

Then it went strange, and forever afterward she never quite understood how it had happened.

She should go down to the beach. The decision floated there in her head, clear and definite. She had decided it was time to go down to the beach. It was just that she couldn’t remember deciding. It was a strange sensation, like feeling full even though you can’t recall having had lunch. And there was something else, fading away fast like an echo without a voice: Everyone has toes!

Milo was a pretty good cook, Mau had to admit. He really knew how to bake fish. The smell hung over the camp when they got back, and the air practically drooled.

There was still plenty of the Sweet Judy left. It would take months, maybe years to break her down. They had the tools now, yes, but not enough people; it would need a dozen strong men to shift some of the bigger timbers. But there was a hut, even if its canvas sides rattled in the wind, and there was fire, and now there was a hearth. And what a hearth! The entire galley had been dragged here, every precious metal bit of it, except for the big black oven itself. That could wait, because there was already a fortune in pots and pan and knives.

And we didn’t make them, Mau thought as the tools were passed around. We can build good canoes, but we could never build the Sweet Judy —

“What are you doing? ” he said to Milo. The man had taken up a hammer and a metal chisel and was bashing away at a smaller chest among the pile of salvage.

“It is locked, ” said Milo, and showed him what a lock was.

“There’s something important inside, then? ” Mau asked. “More metal? ”

“Maybe gold! ” said Pilu. That had to be explained, and Mau remembered the shiny yellow metal around the strange invitation the ghost girl had given him. Trousermen loved it almost as much as trousers, said Pilu, even though it was too soft to be useful. One small piece of gold was worth more than a really good machete, which showed how crazy they were.

But when the hasp broke and the lid was thrown back, the chest was found to contain the smell of stale water and —

“Books? ” said Mau.

“Charts, ” said Pilu. “That’s like a map but, well, looks like this. ” He held up a handful of the charts, which squelched.

“What good are they? ” said Ataba, laughing.

A soggy chart was laid out on the sand. They inspected it, but Mau shook his head. You probably had to be a trouserman to begin to understand.

What did it all mean? It was just lines and shapes. What good were they?

“They are… pictures of what the ocean would look like if you were a bird, high in the sky, ” said Pilu.

“Can trousermen fly, then? ”

“They have tools to help them, ” said Pilu uncertainly. Then he brightened and added: “Like this. ” Mau watched as Pilu pulled a heavy round item from his pile of spoils. “It’s called a compass. With a compass and a chart, they are never lost! ”

“Don’t they taste the water? Don’t they watch the currents? Don’t they smell the wind? Don’t they know the ocean? ”

“Oh, they are good seamen, ” said Pilu, “but they travel to unknown seas. The compass tells them where home is. ”

Mau turned it around in his hand, watching the needle swing.

“And where it isn’t, ” he said. “It has a point at both ends. It shows them where unknown places are, too. Where are we on their chart? ” He pointed to a large area of what was, apparently, land.

“No, that’s Nearer Australia, ” said Pilu. “That’s a big place. We are” — he rummaged through the damp charts and pointed to some marks — “here. Probably. ”

“So where are we, then, ” said Mau, straining to see. “It’s just a lot of lines and squiggles! ”

“Er, those squiggles are called numbers, ” said Pilu nervously. “They tell the captains how deep the sea is. And these are called letters. They say ‘Mothering Sundays. ’ That’s what they call us. ”

“We got told that on the John Dee, ” said Milo helpfully.

“And I’m reading it here on the chart, ” said his brother, giving him a sharp look.

“Why are we called that? ” Mau asked. “We are the Sunrise Islands! ”

“Not in their language. Trousermen often get names wrong. ”

“And the island? How big is the Nation? ” said Mau, still staring at the chart. “I can’t see it. ”

Pilu looked away and mumbled something.

“What did you say? ” said Mau.

“It’s not actually drawn here. It’s too small…. ”

“Small? What do you mean, small? ”

“He’s right, Mau, ” said Milo solemnly. “We didn’t want to tell you. It’s small. It’s a small island. ”

Mau’s mouth was open in astonished disbelief. “That can’t be right, ” he protested. “It’s much bigger than any of the Windcatcher Islands. ”

“Islands that are even smaller, ” said Pilu, “and there’s lots of them. ”

“Thousands, ” said Milo. “It’s just that… well, as big islands go — ”

“ — this is one of the smaller ones, ” Pilu finished.

“But the best one, ” said Mau quickly. “And no one else has got the tree-climbing octopus! ”

“Absolutely, ” said Pilu.

“Just so long as we remember that. This is our home, ” said Mau, standing up. He pulled at the trousers. “Aargh. These really itch! All I can say is trousermen don’t walk about much! ”

A sound made him look up, and there was the ghost girl — at least, it looked like the ghost girl. Behind her stood Cahle with a big grin, and the Unknown Woman, smiling her faint, faraway smile.

Mau looked down at his trousers, and then up at her long hair with the flower in it, while she looked down at her toes and then up at his trousers, which were so much longer than his legs that he appeared to be standing in a pair of concertinas, and the captain’s hat floated on his curls like a ship at sea. She turned to look at Cahle, who stared up at the sky. He looked at Pilu, who looked down at his feet, although his shoulders were shaking.

Then Mau and the ghost girl looked directly into each other’s eyes and there was only one thing they could do, which was to laugh themselves silly.

The others joined in. Even the parrot squawked, “Show us yer drawers! ” and did its doo-dahs on Ataba’s head.

But Milo, who took things sensibly, and who happened to be facing the sea, stood up and pointed and said: “Sails. ”