Eleanor Catton - The Luminaries

‘But the sale of the ship,’ Balfour said after a moment. ‘That’s public knowledge—printed in the papers.’

Lauderback swore. ‘Oh yes,’ he said. ‘According to the paper, I sold that d—ned ship for a very reasonable price indeed, and all in pure. Of course I never saw a penny of it. The gold stayed in that d—ned trunk, and when Godspeed made her voyage to Melbourne the next day, the trunk was collected on the other side—as it had been every month for the past year. And then it disappeared, of course. I couldn’t do a thing about it, without bringing down all hell around my ears. God only knows where that gold is now. And he’s got the ship, to boot.’

Lauderback toyed angrily with the cruet stand.

‘What was the true value of the gold in the trunk—to your eye?’

‘I’m no prospector,’ Lauderback said, ‘but by the weight of the gowns I’d estimate it was a couple of thousand, at least.’

‘And you never saw that gold again.’

‘No.’

‘Or heard tell of it.’

‘No.’

‘Did you ever see the girl again—Lydia Wells?’

Lauderback laughed harshly. ‘Lydia Wells is no girl ,’ he said. ‘I don’t know what she is—but she’s not a girl , Thomas. She’s not a girl .’

But he had not answered Balfour’s question.

‘You know she’s here—in Hokitika,’ Balfour reminded him.

‘So you mentioned,’ said Lauderback grimly, and would not say more.

What a strange, unbroken beast is adulation! How unpredictably it rears its head, and tears against the bridle of its own making! Balfour’s worship of the other man—that which had so easily become petulance—now became, in rising flood, disdain. To have lost so much—and over a mistress ! Over another man’s wife!

Disdain, for all its censorious pretension, is an emotion that can afford a certain clarity. Thomas Balfour watched his friend drain his glass and snap his fingers for another round, and was scornful—and then his scorn gave way to mistrust, and his mistrust to perspicacity. There were elements of Lauderback’s story that still did not fit together. What of the timely death of Crosbie Wells? Lauderback had yet to address that coincidence—just as he had yet to explain why he believed that Carver and Wells had been, of all things, brothers! What of Lydia Wells, who had swept into Hokitika to claim her rightful inheritance, arriving so promptly after his death that the harbour master asked, half in jest, if the Hokitika Post Office had installed a telegraph? Balfour knew without a doubt that he had not been told the whole truth; what he did not know, however, was the reason for this concealment. Whom was Lauderback protecting? Himself merely? Or someone else?

Lauderback’s eyes had sharpened. He leaned forward and stabbed the table with his index finger. ‘You know,’ he said, ‘I’ve just had a thought. About Carver. If his name really is Carver, then the sale of the ship is void. You can’t sign a deed in another man’s name.’

Balfour made no reply. He was distracted by his new appraisal of the other man, and the critical distance that had opened as a sudden gulf of doubt between them.

‘And even if his name is really Wells,’ Lauderback added, brightening further, ‘even if that’s true, Lydia can’t be married to two men at once, can she? It’s as you said: either lying about a marriage, or lying about a name!’

A boy brought a fresh pitcher of wine. Balfour picked it up to refill their glasses. ‘Unless,’ he said as he poured, ‘it wasn’t both at once. She might have divorced the one, and married his brother.’

He used the word ‘brother’ carefully, but Lauderback, who had become excited by this new possibility, did not notice. ‘Even in that case,’ he said, ‘if Carver’s name is really Carver, then his signature is a false one, and the sale of the ship is void. I tell you, Thomas: either way we’ve got him. Either way. We’ve caught Carver in his own lie.’

His relief had made him reckless. Balfour said, ‘So—you’re out to catch him, now?’

Lauderback’s eyes were shining. ‘I shall expose him,’ he said. ‘I shall expose Francis Carver, and take Godspeed back again.’

‘What about the avenger?’ Balfour said.

‘Who?’

‘The fellow who was after Carver. The one who has a twinkle on you.’

‘Never heard a peep,’ said Lauderback. ‘I expect he made all of that up.’

‘You mean he didn’t kill a man?’ said Balfour, lightly. ‘You mean he’s not a murderer?’

‘He’s a blackguard, is what he is,’ Lauderback said. He pounded the table. ‘A blackguard and a liar! And a thief! But I shall catch him on it. I shall make him pay.’

‘What about the elections?’ Balfour said. ‘What about Caroline?’ (This was the name of Lauderback’s wife.)

‘I don’t need to risk all that ,’ Lauderback said scornfully. ‘I can do it privately. Catch him on the contract. Blackmail him—as he did me. Give him a taste of his own medicine.’

Balfour stroked his beard, watching him. ‘Well, now.’

‘Carver will have destroyed his own copy of the bill of sale, most likely, if it’s proof of a lie … I suppose I’ll have to get my copy notarised, to be safe.’

‘Well, now,’ Balfour said again. ‘Perhaps we ought to steady up.’

But Lauderback had sat forward in excitement. ‘There’s no need—I can begin right away!’ he exclaimed. ‘I know exactly where the contract is. It’s packed in my trunk, in that shipping crate you’re taking care of for me.’

Balfour felt his guts clench. His face flooded red. He opened his mouth to reply—and then, in cowardice, closed it.

‘Has the Virtue been and gone already?’ Lauderback said. ‘You were expecting her last week, I think.’

There was a roaring in Balfour’s ears. He ought to have come clean about the disappearance as soon as the two men were left alone. Stupid , he shouted internally, stupid! But could he not simply tell Lauderback the truth? It had been no man’s fault that the shipping crate had disappeared—it had been an accident, a blunder of paperwork most likely—and it would show up, sooner or later, in some unlikely situation … a little battered externally perhaps, but none the worse for wear. Surely Lauderback would understand that! If he was calm and honest in making his confession—if he admitted fault—But then

Balfour’s heart gave a judder. There must be a correlation between the trunk in Lauderback’s story—the one packed with women’s dresses, that had made the trans-Tasman crossing every month for a year—and the trunk containing Lauderback’s effects, the fraudulent contract among them, that had so recently vanished from the Hokitika quay. There must be, when Balfour had never before mislaid a shipping crate, nor had one stolen, not in all his years in the business! His heart began to pound. Francis Carver had blackmailed the politician once before; perhaps he had done so for a second time! Perhaps Carver had stolen the shipping crate! The man was familiar on the Hokitika docks, after all …

Lauderback was casting his eye over the table, looking for a cold morsel; he had not noticed the change in Balfour’s demeanour, as the latter turned over this new possibility in his mind. ‘Has she been through—the Virtue ?’ he repeated, without impatience.

‘No,’ said Balfour.

The room seemed to constrict around the lie.

‘Not here yet?’ said Lauderback. He found a waxy onion on the plate Jock Smith had left behind and popped it into his mouth. ‘So I beat my own clipper ship—and on horseback! I wasn’t expecting that! Nothing went belly-up at sea, I hope?’