Beneath a Black Sun

By Pat Baskett

This unconventional war story alternates between the Solomon Islands, where Tom is liaison officer with the coastwatchers, and rural New Zealand where he returns after World War II. Annie, his younger sister, is cheerful, talented, but her actions contribute to his downfall. A critique of war, a post-colonial view of race relations and an account of post-traumatic stress are embedded here.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Pat Baskett
• Release date: Dec 19, 2010
• ISBN: 9781458077950

Pat Baskett

I'm an ex-journalist. I wrote general feature articles for the New Zealand Herald, but my special interest was art, literature and music. I wrote this novel because I had three uncles who fought in the Solomon Islands during World War 11. Two were hard-case farmers and the third, whom I never knew very well, was quieter and never looked at ease in uniform. I decided to explore their experiences and particularly those of the uncle who seemed somewhat of a misfit. He became the novel's anti-hero. Much less has been written about the war in the Pacific than about the campaigns in Europe. My research brought to light aspects of the islands' history and their colonial past. I spent three weeks there as a volunteer journalist for Oxfam in 1993 and stayed in villages. This experience gave me a feeling for the place which I hope comes through in my novel.

Book preview

Beneath a Black Sun

by Pat Baskett

A novel set on New Georgia,

Solomon Islands, 1943, and

in rural New Zealand.

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2010 Pat Baskett

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Chapter One

Fire crackled in the distance, the ragged, spiky sound of pine cones bursting as the shaggy mane of another branch dissolved into smoke. Grey plumes rose above the boundary ridge straight up in the windless air, spreading like a stain beneath the dark clouds. The wood was still wet after the winter, the fire slow and dirty. Tom, riding backwards in the trailer, twisted his head to see it.

That’s Bert, Jim said. Dropped those trees in the autumn. Must’ve used a heap of petrol.

Strange, lighting a bonfire of wet wood. The thought flickered across Tom’s mind but he didn’t have the energy to utter the words. He’d got off his bed for the milking - that was something.

Either the pump’s playing up or a pipe’s leaking, Jim had said. When they finished feeding out they had headed to the back of the farm, the dog loping beside the tractor. They turned off the cocks at each trough as they passed, stopping at the pumphouse where the macrocarpa were as old as the farm itself. Younger, though, than the three flat stones with sharp edges Tom had picked up in the days when he and Silas built forts beneath the trees. Adzes, Maori adzes. He had put them in a box under his bed. Had Harriet thrown them out when he was away? Those old Maori, how did they live? Were they different from the Solomon Islanders he knew? He remembered Margaret watching him take out his pocket knife, when he had been sick.

Jim was looking at him, beginning to speak, when a sudden blast drowned his words. Tom leaped off the trailer, flung Jim to the ground and pulled him underneath, lying there with his arms over his head. Seconds later, or minutes which were eternity, he felt a hand on his shoulder, heard Jim’s voice.

The war’s over, boy. It’s Bert blasting his stumps out. Here, come and see.

Tom crawled out and looked at the landscape where the trees were macrocarpa not palms, the pump was throbbing and dust rose in a cloud beside the bonfire. The air’s chill surprised him. He shivered and sat down because his legs wouldn’t hold him.

Sorry, he said when he could speak. Sorry about that.

Jim picked up his hat, banged the mud off it against the side of the tractor.

The dog must’ve cleared out home. Let’s get on with the day, take your mind off things. You check that pipe and I’ll see to the pump.

Pushing himself off the ground, Tom walked unsteadily over to the trough, found the pipe – a black snake that disappeared into the grass.

Chapter Two

A road. They said there was a road, the maps showed a line. Some said HQ drew the maps, others that the road was just a track, a typical island footpath. What were they doing, then, unloading trucks and jeeps? Tom bit into the slab of dry bread and corned beef. The stuff was like sand in his mouth. Tea, he craved tea – hot, strong, with a pang in the gullet like a shot of whisky. The field kitchens were still packed in the belly of the landing craft, they’d be lucky to get hot food this evening, He lifted his face to the sky, opened his mouth, let the rain trickle over his Adams apple. It pooled with the sweat in the hollows of his neck, ran down his chest inside his shirt. Black muck caked his shorts, mud like he had never seen before - an ocean of black bog that oozed through the pores of his skin and lay like a blanket over his mind. How many trips had he made back and forth up the beach into the forest? They’d enjoyed the rain at first, the sweat steaming off their bodies, grateful there was no sun, joked that it would wash their shirts. But its effects were grotesque. By mid-morning the white coral across which the trucks and jeeps chugged resembled a churned-up cattle race. Those that didn’t make it squatted like helpless beasts, their spinning wheels screaming.

They had been ordered to rest. Tom lowered his haunches onto the narrow running board of a stranded truck and surveyed the chaos: boxes of ammunition, drums of fuel, canvas hold-alls, food crates, tents, garbage cans, shovels, spades. Did they really need all that junk? In the other direction lay the sea, misty with rain, still and pure. He would have thought it beautiful if he didn’t hate the place. It was at least a reminder. Somewhere lay the possibility of peace.

The last brittle crumb slid down his throat. How long would it be before they ate again, he wondered. He crumpled the wrapper, stumped down to the water’s edge and unclipped the water bottle from his belt, filled his mouth and spat. Everything tasted of mud.

Got any dry fags? His brother Silas splashed shirtless into the sea beside him.

Tom wiped a hand on his shorts, fished a packet out of his breast pocket. Dunno about the matches.

I’ve got a lighter that goes. Silas flicked the silver wheel. The water lapped gently at their knees as they surveyed the beach. Give me Taranaki mud any day.

Yeah, Tom replied. And cowshit." How he ached for the smell of it, standing there beside his brother, knowing he, too, could see in his mind the shed filled with the pale backs of the jerseys.

Suddenly gunfire split the air a hundred yards along the beach and they bounded out of the sea to the truck.

Fucken bloody snipers, Silas muttered.

Was it five minutes they crouched there, arms cupped over their heads, pressed against the truck’s warm metal side? At last the volleys ceased. Stretcher bearers emerged from the landing craft to pick up three men who lay like bundles abandoned in the mire. A megaphone ordered the soldiers back to duties.

Silas stood up. Suppose I’d better be seeing you, old son. He grinned a lop-sided smile in which his teeth gleamed too whitely against his tanned, mud-smeared face.

Tom sat on the running board and drew on his cigarette, hands not quite still. From the forest verge came the groan of bulldozers winching vehicles over submerged coconut logs. A waste of time, the corduroy road. Like so much else in this bloody war. He tossed his butt into the mud, picked up a canvas hold-all, humped it onto his back and set off to where his platoon was hacking away the undergrowth for the night’s bivouac. Davies had taken off his shirt and was swinging a slasher with a slow rhythmical chop, sweat glistening on his back, each vertebra sticking out like shiny knuckle bones. Beside Davies, Harris worked with the jerky movements of a terrier. Further away Hagar pulled on a cigarette as if his life depended on it. They laboured on until Chambers appeared from behind a heap of boxes.

Okay guys. Better start digging. Dark’s about an hour away. Good luck finding a dry spot.

Tom picked up his spade, slung his kit over his shoulder. That’s it. I’m out’a here, as far as I can get. The trees were a godsend, a barrier between him and the camp where voices filled his head like a swarm of bees. Gradually, as he pushed aside vines, strode through ferns and tall grasses, a silky silence encased him. And if he was missed? What was a week on fatigues! Of all the risks they faced, it seemed the least. Not too far. I’ll need to get back. In front of him the ground rose to a knoll, above a narrow creek where water trickled down to the beach. He crouched beneath a tall tree. Was it a mango, he wondered. The smaller, straggly ones were pandanus. Through their slender leaves he glimpsed the shore, dazzling white in the low, late sun, and heard the mesmerising slap-slap of waves, the rasping of coral sucked back and forth with each surge. This was the place, under the tree. He could slip back after dark. He thrust his spade into the crisp coral. Was it a risk? Nobody would miss him in the dark, he would tell Ginger he’d found a spot. He dug fast, then paused. Above him parrots chattered. He looked for their bright red and green plumage. But when he glanced up the grey cloth of a Jap’s uniform hung between the branches. His fear lasted a fraction of a second. Feet and hands dangled from a body pockmarked with holes, the lolling head still wore its peaked cap. Around the torso the pale strands of a rope showed where the sniper was tied to the trunk. Flies buzzed around the face, blotting out the eye sockets. He was hardly more than a boy. Kamikaze they called the pilots who dive-bombed ships. What was the word for a man who had himself tied to a tree to await death?

The fellow’s gun lay like an abandoned toy in the branches of a shrub with yellow flowers. Their centres were bright red – blood red. Everything on this island was tainted. You’ve gone to the best place, he told the sagging torso. I’d go, too, if I had the guts.

Where you been?

Ginger’s head, then shoulders emerged from the ground.

Oh, there and back…. Tom scraped the last cold baked bean from his plate.

Some death wish take you there?

You could say I was casing the joint for snipers.

Lucky you weren’t taken for one yourself, you silly bugger.

Tom shrugged. You found somewhere dry?

Here. On the other side of this tree. Ginger levered himself out of his foxhole. They’ve got cocoa at the mess. Want some?

Sure, thanks. Tom set his kit against the trunk, tested the ground with his spade. Where was Silas, he wondered as he dug. The earth came out sticky and black, he was digging a grave, not a bed. His arms ached, his stomach was hollow. Around him the yellow lights of kerosene lanterns cast weird shadows, men moved like ghosts amongst the foliage, their voices harsh with tiredness and hunger.

How’ya goin’ there? Hagar’s cigarette glowed red as he sucked air through it.

Yeah, alright, you?

I’m filling my stomach with a dream. Roast beef. Whaddaya reckon?

Hagar was always moaning about the food. Beside him two shapes were crouched close together around a lantern – Davies and Harris earnestly sorting gear.

Ginger set two mugs on the rim of their foxholes. Another night in this fuckin’ mud. How many does that make?

Tom rubbed his itching back against the foxhole wall – jungle rot where the strap of his pack chafed. He couldn’t remember when they had last washed nor when they had changed their socks. Stretching out his legs, knees not quite straight, he wriggled his toes inside his wet boots.

Buggered if I know. Most of our lives, I’d say.

I guess how much longer’s the question. You hear what Mint said? The Japs have finally given up on Guadalcanal, most of them pretty near dead.

The fate of a defeated army in the jungle didn’t bear thinking about. Tom felt his fingers tighten around the thin tin of his mug. Cold cocoa seemed a slender guarantee of their present security and the prospect of sleep held no promise that they would live another day.

So where did you get to on your walk? Ginger’s voice came through the dark.

Oh, not far. I found the monkey man.

Bloody monkey men. I saw one once launch himself onto a tank – one of those magnetic mines in his hand. Those guys aren’t real.

This one had tied himself to the trunk. He looked like a kid.

They’re all kids. Like us. I’ll have my twenty-first in this bloody place unless we get off our arses. Ginger slapped the ground with a stick. Tied to a tree. Curtains. Come and get me. Shit, rather him than me, is all I can say. I’m going to try for some kip before the maniacs wake us. At least the rain’s stopped.

Mud squelched as Ginger curled himself up. Tom pulled his pack in beside him, propped it against the edge and closed his eyes.

Dear Mum, he wrote in his head, I keep having this dream. You’re in the kitchen, your hands covered in flour. The sink is full of dishes and you’re telling me you’re too busy. I don’t know what for. Through the window the mountain is red, as if it’s on fire. Somebody’s calling. I’m standing there in the doorway, in my socks and dirty clothes from the cowshed. A voice is shouting out orders. But I’m looking at you, at your tired face with its smile. I’m remembering the smell of the bread you make. Then there’s a terrible noise, like the mountain’s erupting and suddenly you’re lying on the floor and I wake up, shaking. But the picture I have in my head isn’t of you at all. It’s the body I found in the bush behind a village. They’d tied her arms and legs to stakes. I think it was the Japs. Sometimes I’m ashamed to be a man. Only the thought that I’m stopping the war reaching you and Annie keeps me going.

The moisture in his socks was as warm as his feet, the cocoa had half-filled the niche in his stomach that craved one more ladle of beans. His limbs loosened, he knew he would sleep.

He was a boy in an asphalt playground. They were throwing a ball at him. The ball came before he had his eye on it – wham into his chest, thud against the side of his head. He stretched out his hands to ward it off. Sometimes he caught it and launched it back. No! they shouted. Over here! He tried to think of the things he was good at. He could do sums, he could read. He was good at drawing. He was, his mother told him, a good boy. Not like Silas.

The first drops slid off the leaves onto his face like the annoying footfall of flies. Small rivers ran down his forearms into the crook of his elbows. He turned up his grimy collar, hid his face inside his shirt. Fractious voices punctuated the downpour’s drone.

Bloody hell, Ginger muttered.

Tom pulled his wet shirt away from his chest, rested his head against the rim of the foxhole and felt mud ooze inside his collar. He thought himself back into the playground.

He was the skinny, curly-headed blond kid with the funny eyes. And no father. Just uncles and a mother. The one who found little crawling creatures on the straggly weeds that poked through the fence. Ladybirds, red spotted and yellow spotted, tiny red spiders they called pennydoctors, spiders with black pincers the other kids said were poisonous. Sometimes he picked up a weta on a stick. Yuk! The kids shrieked. Then Silas would appear, knock the treasure out of his hand and laugh.

A night bird shrieked. Wheeoo, wheeeoo it jeered. Like an echo its mate answered wheeo, wheeoo.

There’s a whole bloody bunch of them up there, Tom moaned.

Shoot the buggers, Ginger advised.

Tom smirked. I’ll hold the torch for you.

The bird flew off with a whirr and they tried once more to sleep. Beetles, or were they rats, scuttled across the forest floor. A soft clunk and Tom was alert. Clunk, clunk. A muffled metallic clang – the familiar noise of safety catches on weapons. He held his breath. How many of them were there? Keep still, everybody, keep quiet! Unmistakably metallic, over by the field kitchen. Boots stumbling against the jettisoned tins of the night’s meal. Would they wait until some poor sod shrieked out his terror? Or spray the whole forest with their lethal pellets? Tom slid his shoulders down the wall of the foxhole until his head was below the rim.

Land crabs, said Ginger alongside him. Land crabs, kiddo, checking out the leftovers for a meal. Japs don’t kick tins around in the night.

God you’re a smart bugger. Land crabs all right. Go to sleep.

Did they sleep? He never knew. Men moaned, shouted. Tom opened his eyes and watched the fireflies darting tracks through the blackness. Suddenly a voice – a wailing, high-pitched, banshee-like shriek. And again. A drawn out alloo, alloo, alloo. Tom ceased breathing. A cold clamp gripped his stomach, every muscle in his body rigid. Hallooo! Hallooo! This time it was closer, from the direction of the shore. Another voice echoed it, only deeper – hallouu, hallouu. And then laughter – a mirthless, evil sound that ricocheted back and forth between several voices.

Christ! Ginger’s voice hissed. Tom! You there?

Tom stretched his arm over the top of the foxhole, their fingers met, hands fumbled, then locked.

This is it. They’ll slaughter us. This is it.

Hold on, just hold on.

What was there to hold on to, except this shred of human contact? The darkness was electric. Why didn’t they just chuck their grenades, get it over with? His hand against Ginger’s wrist was clammy. He felt the bristly hairs, Ginger’s thumb pressed into his wrist. The banshees hallooed again.

Lieutenant Mason! the Jap voice cried out. Lieutenant Mason!

Shit. How do they know Mint’s name?

Lieutenant Chambers! Lieutenant Chambers! Ghoulishly, the words distorted.

The imperial... Japanese army.... will.... destroy you!.... You hear?

The tips of Ginger’s nails bit into Tom’s skin.

Everybody shut the fuck up! he hissed.

Sampson. Sargeant Sampson. Your....death.... is.... near!

Strident, grating across the nerves, the voice rose higher and higher. The enemy were not men but fiends whose weapons destroyed minds, devils who used not guns, but words to undermine courage. Sobs came from several directions, muffled orders for the men to remain in their foxholes.

Your dee-aath is nee-aar! wailed the voice in a vibrato shriek.

Its answer a gunshot, then a volley of shots followed by screaming. Tom slid back inside his foxhole, hands over his head, waiting for the grenade. The shots ceased but the panic continued. Men cursed, called out names. The screams subsided into cries for help, pathetically different from the surreal taunts of a few seconds before. An urgent call, in a serious, familiar tone, for a lamp and a medic.

The new day promised no more rain. The men scraped the last oats from their bowls, swirled the cold liquid in their mugs, the greyness of their faces matching the light leaking through the trees. Tom squatted between Ginger and Silas, listening to Mint, his shirt clean and crisp. How does he do it, Tom wondered. Higgins with a head wound, Watson shot in the shoulder, Smith with a smashed jaw – Mint’s clipped vowels droned on. Tom registered the voice rather than the words, felt the strange comfort the sound brought, the security of authority, someone to take responsibility. What was the man saying? That they’d have to share foxholes? God, they’d be sleeping on their feet, next! And something about no shooting at night.

… Offenders will spend two weeks on fatigue duty. But if any man can produce a Jap he’s killed with his knife – I repeat – with his knife – he can have a twenty-four hour rest in the rear. This mindless bloody shooting’s got to stop.

Can’t say that’s a bad thing, m’self, Silas murmured.

Mint drained his tea. I have a special duty for Corporal Tom Hislop. He’s to come to my tent in ten minutes.

Silas knuckled Tom’s forearm. Hey, old buddy, that’s you. You get all the perks.

You reckon? His tiredness melted away.

Chapter Three

Five-thirty. Harriet pulled the blankets over her head and buried herself in the smell of bodies, hers and Jim’s. Would Tom get up? She strained to hear a footstep, the chink of his cup. Jim had been gone half an hour. She reached out her hand for the light switch, swung her feet onto the lino and pulled her slippers from under the bed. In the kitchen the tea was still hot under the cosy. She filled a cup, took it to the boys’ room off the porch. In the doorway she listened to their breathing, Tom the hump nearest the door, Silas under the window. The blind was up and she looked for the mountain. It came at last, a pale glimmer no larger than the moon. She put the cup on the table between the beds and leaned over Tom. He smelled of sweat and cows.

Here’s some tea. Can you get up? She tweaked the blanket away from his face. Tea, dear?

He groaned, flung the covers back over his head.

Mum? Is he crook again? Silas pushed himself up on his elbow.

Harriet stretched a hand towards the bump of a shoulder. The cows, dear. You need to get up.

The cows can go to hell. Leave me alone! He crashed back onto the pillow with a force that made the wirewove ping and the iron bed legs grate.

I’ll go, Silas said, sitting up.

No, you’ve got a day’s work ahead of you. I’ll help Jim.

I can easily do an hour. Where’s that tea?

She put the cup in Silas’s hand, turned the light on in the porch so that he could see to dress, then went back through the kitchen. In her room she sat on the bed, the urge to put her head on the pillow strong. The day felt old. In that spot between her ribs, a clammy numbness, a dread of what might be wrong with Tom. How like his father he looked! But Charlie was dead. The numbness was the same that had seized her when they came to tell her. She let the blind spring to the top of the window, looked again for the mountain. The August dawn shed pink rays like darts across its eastern flank.

By seven o’clock the flames in the coal range were licking past the damper and up the chimney. Harriet shut off the air intake and moved the kettle to the side. The porridge was thickening. She scraped the lumps from the bottom of the pot with the wooden spoon and flattened them against the side. On the coolest part of the stove the frying pan held little islands of yellow in a sea of melted fat. There had been ice on the chooks’ water this morning. She leaned over the range, breathing in the smell of macrocarpa, thawing her red fingers, feeling the warmth condense on the tip of her nose. The ritual of breakfast, these familiar objects, the day that uncurled every morning in the same way…. Life was as fragile as cut-out dolls, their links to one another as easily severed, ripped apart by the flimsiest of tugs. One snip, one misdirected move and the whole chain was in tatters. You started again. There was no choice.

Surely he would eat breakfast? Harriet opened the fridge and counted out six chops, put them with the leftover potato on the rack. From the corner cupboard she pulled out the cloth with its faded flowers and threadbare fold lines, spread it over one end of the table, reached into the cupboard again and laid three places. Jim would bring the milk in a billy, warm from the shed. She sat a jug on the bench.

Mum. Annie came in from the hall. It’s gym today. I need my rompers.

Candlewick dressing gown wrapped around her shoulders, she scuffed her way to the lavatory outside, hair floating around her like streamers. She was sixteen, old enough for a job. But Harriet didn’t want her working, yet.

Where’s Silas? Annie asked when she came back. Did Tom go to the shed?

Harriet opened the safe and put a plate of butter on the bench, picked up the dishcloth, dabbed at a spot on the terrazzo.

He didn’t eat dinner last night, either, Annie murmured.

Tom’s gloom cast a shadow over them all. He trapped them into uttering words of false comfort that made them bite their tongues, he shamed them with his utterances about the lives they led. He was too high-minded, Silas said.

No, Harriet confirmed. He didn’t. Silas went to the shed. He’ll be late for work.

Do you know where my rompers are?

From the airing cupboard Harriet pulled a tangle of underwear onto the cane chair. She took the rompers to Annie who stood in front of her dressing table with her hairbrush.

My hair’s like boxthorn.

Harriet smiled. Annie had her grandmother’s curls. Her daughter put down her brush.

I’ll take him some tea, if you like.

If anyone could get a response, it was Annie.

See if he’ll have a bath.

Harriet poured herself a cup and sat with it at the table. Some day they would do up this room, change its blotchy cream wallpaper, throw out the old cushions, buy a new print to replace the faded mountain that hung beneath the picture rail. One of the boys had given it to her for a birthday, or Christmas. She swallowed her tea, the first since she had woken, then put her elbows on the table and listened for Annie’s voice.

Hey old man, Annie piped from the porch. You feeling bad? Why don’t you drink this? The bed creaked. You sleep in your clothes?

Answer her, Harriet urged him. Say something.

Want me to run you a bath? Annie said into the silence. You smell like the cowshed. Mum’s cooking chops this morning. You should eat something. You want a bath?

Harriet stood up and moved the frying pan onto the hot part of the stove as Annie went into the bathroom and turned the taps on. Silas kicked his boots off at the door.

I’ll just grab some porridge, Mum.

The chops are ready and I’ve made your lunch.

He ate with his forearms spread wide on the table, bending his wrists, the spoon moving back and forth between the plate and his mouth.

You won’t have time for a shave, Harriet remarked.

Nah. But the porkers won’t notice. I’ll stay a bit later to make up the time.

She listened for the sound of his motorbike in the garage, the roar as it sped off to the bacon factory. Five minutes and Annie would be gone, too.

You look neat, Harriet said, reaching to straighten her daughter’s tie.

Annie moved away. I’ve got band practice after school today. Gary said he’d drop me back at the bus stop.

Harriet stood on the step and watched her wheel her bicycle out of the garage. Gary? She didn’t know about him. They’d met him, of course, at the dance when the band had played, Annie with the clarinet that belonged to the school. They had been so proud of her they’d hardly noticed him. Uncomfortable, both of them, Jim wearing his tie like a yoke and she worried that her lipstick was smudged, fiddling with her clip-on earrings. The discomfort was worth it for the sake of the music and for her daughter, her beautiful golden-haired daughter pedalling now, down the muddy drive. Wednesday. She should have remembered. Band practice. How else would Annie get home? She went back into the kitchen, picked up the wooden spoon to flatten a wad of mashed potato - whack, whack, whack patting it into a cake, round and round, the edges needlessly neat. Finally she stopped, embarrassed by her obsession.

Tom came out of the bathroom as she and Jim were finishing their porridge, in clean clothes,