STORY GALLERY - APRIL-MAY 2023

As her fingernail scraped over one of the unusual lumps on his belly a huge white maggot popped out in front of her disbelieving eyes. Entrapped still in the wiry hair it left a finger sized glutinous-looking pink hole lengthwise just under the swollen skin.

How was she to know how her interest in this revolting introduction to Zambian bush life would have men seeking her out? How many no-longer-desperate single men would offer her name to other desperate men who would visit her secretly. Always in the evening after a hot day’s work, usually with a nonchalant greeting and always their shirts came off first.

Renting the house had been simple. Utterly straightforward, no third parties involved, nothing in writing. Twenty pounds a month, look after Harry the lively mongrel, and keep Tickey the houseboy employed at his usual wages. Kerosene lamps, wood stove, well with a pump, hot water from a woodfired “donkey”, an inside loo, which was real luxury, and a large rose garden. Ticky turned out to be worth his weight in gold, even if sometimes the loo flushed boiling water- a problem with over enthusiasm with the donkey fire. It was disconcerting but not dangerous. Harry was a light in our lives.

Those early months were idyllic. They jogged in the cool early mornings with Harry before work, before the heat clamped down. Learning to cook with a wood stove when they got home from work in the evenings. Driving the bush track to the main road into town, waiting for the dust from the previous car to settle enough before they could see the road clearly. Greeting every other traveller as a friend. Picking the flame lilies that reflected their names, coiling into glowing luxuriant growth after the first rains.

They never knew what killed Harry, possibly the bull terrier from next door, but it could have been something more sinister. All they had was a dead mauled body to bury and their grieving was uncomplicated. Gone, one joyful carefree companion whose happiness was so much a part of theirs. A Harry- sized gap in their lives. Almost in compensation they found that she was pregnant, so it seemed the perfect time to move into town.

A few years later they moved bush again. Zambia, close to the Congo border, was in the 1950’s, in many places fairly uncivilised. A house might have an inside loo, but there would also (if you were lucky) be a generator, a well and a tank. Their tank had been built on top of a three metre high anthill. Appreciate it, they were told- those ants are extinct now.

Puitse fly strike, which had been Harry’s problem, was for some strange reason an embarrassing secret. It’s effect on people was downplayed. As an aside, mothers advised always, always iron nappies, as puitsies lay their eggs on damp clothes like cloth nappies being sundried on family clotheslines. Think sweat-soaked shirts clinging to the backs of men working outdoors.

Strange men would turn up during otherwise quiet evenings. Often their first words were ‘Jack up the road said you might be able to help me…’ “Possibly,“ she’d say. “What’s the problem?” Then they would expose backs dotted with seemingly suppurating boils that they had tried in vain to scratch effectively. Not boils at all but live maggots making homes in live flesh. Excruciatingly itchy it was mind-blowingly difficult for otherwise competent men to deal with. Waiting for the life cycle to complete and the maggots to leave of their own accord as in Harry’s case, was never an option. “Get these things out of me before I go off my head, they’re driving me insane!” was the repeated refrain.

The maggot grows in a reinforced cocoon in the live skin that the tiny fly larva burrows into, one entry/exit that seeps fluid randomly. None of these men had the time or patience to use Vaseline and wait so it was always a gruesome painful job with a needle. She knew that some of them boasted about the pain she had inflicted, that mostly, they had endured in silence.

Never queasy about the task as most women were, but efficient and pragmatic she always found solving their problems an interesting challenge. Understanding that being trapped in a body that is hosting another very active life form really messes with your brain, she crossed her fingers and always used a very hot iron.

The barbs from the lawyer vine whipped across my face and drew blood. Mixed with the perspiration it dripped onto my white shirt. ‘You OK Missus’ the voice came from behind. I turned and smiled at Constable Manu who had obviously been positioned behind me to make sure this white Missus didn’t drop back or come to any harm.

The temperature was rising and steam rose from the ground from last night's rain with a sweet sickly smell from the humus. Although early in the morning the humidity was overpowering and I concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other, not wanting to hold up the patrol ahead. As we silently walked along the narrow path on a ridge high in the rainforest, through a clearing the Pacific Ocean sparkled and smoke from a small village rose in the air. Villagers could be seen going about their early morning chores. Meris with grass brooms were sweeping the paths while the children ran about feeding the pigs and chooks.

The heat was a constant on this small tropical island two degrees from the equator, although the two barefoot villagers wearing only lap laps, and the police bois in their heavy blue serge uniforms quite unsuitable but worn proudly, showed no sign of fatigue. I however was well covered to avoid the leeches that could fall from the trees and latch on unnoticed. We could hear the early morning calls from the beautiful crowned pigeons but had no time to stop for any possible sighting.

Our patrol consisted of two local villagers, two police bois, my husband the Inspector in Charge of the Manus Police District, and Dr Ted Swartz, a young anthropologist with the Department of Natural History in America living on the island with his young family, continuing the work of the renowned anthropologist Margaret Mead. Ted had suffered badly from malaria after a recent visit up the Sepik river on the north coast of New Guinea and was covered from head to toe to avoid any mosquitos. I was allowed to join the group after assurance that I would not linger or interfere with the operation.

The Two villagers had arrived at the Lorengau Police Station the previous day, to report a ‘man e di pinis’. After questioning it was determined that a skeleton had been discovered in a cave in the forest in the hills behind the town of Lorengau. The year was 1964, almost twenty years after the war when the Japanese had taken over the Manus Island group before it was reclaimed by the Americans.

After a seemingly endless trek through the jungle, we arrived at the cave almost covered by vines. After some discussion, a rope was dropped and a police boi and my husband entered. Before entering the main cave they saw the skeleton which was laid out at the entrance and appeared to be booby trapped.

“It is too dangerous to enter further, so we will return and contact the Australian Navy specialists at HMAS Tarangau on the island of Los Negros, for them to defuse the bomb” was announced.

I tried to hide my disappointment, for I had dreamt of finding the skeleton guarding a chest of gold and jewels left by some early explorer. Not that the cave had been a munitions dump for the Japanese.

Our return seemed slower, the temperature had risen and the excitement had dissipated. The sun had climbed higher and now filtered through the trees to expose the vivid colours of the fungi on the tree branches. ‘Misses, Misses’, and I turned to see Manu pointing to a young tree kangaroo on a branch above looking  down at us. Manu proudly announced “Dis gut pela kai kai” which made me sad to see this beautiful creature knowing it could end up on a cooking fire.

The following day the bomb was disabled, the skeleton removed and brought to the police station by the two navy personnel and the two villagers in an old sack along with some rusted boot buckles. Ted the Anthropologist, after examining the skull deemed it to be Asian, with the buckles indicating it being a Japanese Officer as only the Officers wore boots. The navy would be responsible for the ammunition in due course.

The villagers smiled when they were advised by the Police Officer not to go down the cave again, and not to try and remove any of the stored ammunition. ‘Yes Masta’ they iterated as they left the police station laughing.

EPILOGUE

Post WW2, the Australians established a Naval base pm the island of Los Negros in the Admiralty Group after the Americans had withdrawn. They offered all their equipment to the Australian Government for 2 million dollars. This was countered by an offer from the Australians of 1 million, which was rejected, so the Americans bulldozed all their infrastructure into the jungle including a fully functioning hospital, dozens of barges driven ashore on the Loniu Passage, as well as a huge naval carrier anchored in the lagoon.

By the 1960s the natives were coming to the police station to register new jeeps which had been dumped in the jungle in boxes. A scrap metal agent was making a fortune, and new buildings were being erected from materials dug out of the hillside.