Hammond Innes - Solomons Seal

A card was raised. It was Berners. ‘And two-fifty,’ he said in his sharp, rather acid voice.

‘Seventeen two-fifty, seventeen thousand two-fifty, I’m bid … ’ The knocker was poised. ‘Five hundred, seven-fifty, eighteen thousand — and a hundred? Thank you …’ The bidding crawled upwards, then came to an abrupt halt with Berners jumping several hundreds to nineteen thousand. The auctioneer waited, his eyes searching the room. ‘At nineteen thousand pounds — to Mr Berners.’ The knocker fell, the sound of it sharp in the stillness.

Perenna and I looked at each other, smiling. In less than ten minutes, allowing for commission, everything, we had raised some £30,000. It was fantastic. Keegan was suddenly standing in front of Perenna congratulating her, and she was so excited she leapt to her feet and threw her arms round his neck. We went out then to the little office at the back, where Keegan produced a bottle of champagne. And after that we drove slowly back through the late afternoon sunshine, stopping at an hotel near Cambridge to linger over dinner, discussing all the various possibilities now that we had the capital we needed. It didn’t matter now whether it was the PNG government or a Lloyd’s syndicate that finally established prior claim on the LCT, we could afford to buy it, and with the ship as security we could raise the loan as and when we needed it.

That evening, back at the hall, we walked beside the moat hand-in-hand in the moonlight, still talking it over, dreaming dreams of ships and islands, a world I think we both knew in our hearts would take a deal of sweat and blood to translate into reality. And then Perenna suddenly stopped and turned and faced me, holding my hand tight as she said, ‘That day you left Bougainville — remember what you said as you walked out to the plane?’

‘What?’ I asked, teasingly.

‘You know bloody well.’

I nodded, laughing and lifting her off her feet, carrying her in my arms. ‘For tonight,’ I said, ‘you’ll just have to be content with this.’ I was kissing her as I carried her across the threshold. ‘Tomorrow I’ll think about making an honest woman of you.’ We were both of us laughing as we went up to bed. The moon was very bright that night and there were owls hooting — Bougainville and the Pacific seemed a million miles away, and so did reality. What fun life is! What a glorious everlasting struggle to survive and to build something worthwhile! And as I fell asleep, I was thinking of that indomitable old man, her grandfather, sailing out in his canoe towards the horizon and infinity.