The Beachcomber

Gray arrives on the ship as the new British Resident, in full uniform and brimming with the excitement of a tropical posting. He is told that the last Governor shot himself from loneliness, a grim preface that tempers his enthusiasm. The scene sets the island's blend of ambition and isolation that will frame his tenure.

On landing, he is invited to stay by the missionary Owen Jones and his sister Martha, promising hospitality before official quarters are ready. He learns that his lodgings are not yet prepared, leaving him in a state of temporary accommodation uncertainty. The cordial welcome contrasts with the practical hurdle of housing.

That evening, he is visited by Edward Wilson, known to the locals as the Honourable Ted. Ted drinks a large amount of Gray's whisky and speaks with polished rhetoric that belies his rough edge. Despite warnings that Ted is a scoundrel, Gray finds him unexpectedly engaging.

Exactly a year after his arrival, Ted is arrested for encouraging a girl at the mission to steal money and becomes involved in a drunken brawl. Gray breaks with precedent and sentences him to three months' hard labour on a neighbouring island. The decision marks a rare assertiveness in his governance and establishes a rift with Ted.

While Ted serves his sentence, the local headman suffers appendicitis. Martha travels out with her brother, who is unwell, to perform the operation, and she successfully saves the headman's life. She also tends to an elephant that had injured its trunk in a crocodile attack.

On the return journey, the boat's propeller fails and they are forced to spend the night on a small desert island. Martha fears Ted will molest her, but he keeps to himself and even covers her with blankets to keep her warm. The incident highlights the uneasy undercurrents between them but ends without violence.

Back in the capital, Martha becomes slightly infatuated with Ted, seeing signs of goodness she believes lie beneath his rakish exterior. Ted remains aloof, his drinking and crude behavior persisting, and he ignores her attempts to know him better. A second brawl erupts, prompting Gray to remove him from the island by deportation to Australia.

Cholera sweeps the northern islands, and all hands are needed in the capital; only Martha can be spared to go and treat the outbreak, provided she takes Ted with her. He initially refuses to help but eventually agrees to accompany her, haunted by a growing sense of guilt. The pair thus departs for the north to confront the epidemic.

On the northern islands, the inhabitants blame the Europeans for the spread of disease and fear retaliation. Martha persuades them to accept help, reminding them of the headman's saved life months earlier. Ted and Martha throw themselves into the work of fighting the illness.

As they labor together, the two begin to grow fond of each other, and both undergo personal changes: Martha moves from repression toward sensuous self-awareness, and Ted shifts from a morally dubious figure toward an upstanding ally. The emotional arc deepens amid the crisis.

After failing to save a young woman, they are seized by a mob and threatened with death. They are pegged out and nearly trampled by an elephant, but the animal stops at the last moment, recognizing Martha from her earlier nursing. Astonished by the miraculous survival, the locals let them go.

Back in the capital, Martha and Ted marry and he takes up playing the organ to accompany her in the mission. Gray takes some satisfaction from the fact that the number of deaths has dramatically reduced since the last outbreak. He believes future outbreaks may be contained with fewer fatalities.