Jessica eagerly took the cable and rushed below to record the momentous fact in her Journal. Later, at the weather station, we were given more detail. Except for one other ship, on the edge of the disturbance, West Island and the Phoenix had been the only ones in a position to report the out-of-season cyclone. Several hundred miles to the south the freighter Hollywood had reported rough seas, confused swell, and a barometer of 1003. Mr. Lardi, meteorologist at Qantas, showed us all their records and was delighted when I turned over the data from my log so that he could round out the picture. The eye of the cyclone had passed between the Phoenix and the islands, coming down out of the northeast. At the height of the storm, the Qantas rain gauge measured seven inches in 75 minutes, and the barometer dropped to 988 millibars. Peak winds were over 70 knots, or almost 80 miles an hour.
Barely within cyclone range but, as Jessica pointed out, “It was a real cyclone, even if it was a little one—just the way even a baby dragon would be a real dragon!” Even with my dull adult mind I was able to follow her logic.
Locally, damage had been considerable. All the powerboats in the lagoon had been sunk or put out of commission—an embarrassing circumstance for the Air and Sea Rescue Service. Both power and water had failed on West Island; a number of houses were damaged, and several score palm trees were blown down or decapitated. The roof of the passenger terminal at the airstrip had been blown away. The schoolhouse was completely demolished, the walls knocked down, and even the books blown away. Only the blackboard had been left unharmed but this, as the schoolmaster put it, had been “well and truly washed.” There were no serious injuries.
The Keeling-Cocos have one distinction which will always stand out in our minds: never have so many parties been given so often by so few. Any occasion, it seemed, was sufficient reason for a whingding: the 21st birthday of one of the C. & W. “Exiles,” the arrival of a yacht, the miracle of having survived a cyclone—or “just because it’s Thursday, you know.”
Parties to welcome visiting yachts are rather rare, to judge from the visitors’ book in the C. & W. office. I counted only five yachts, from 1952 until the arrival of the Phoenix in 1956.
Supply ships, we were told, came almost as rarely and the Cable and Wireless people, who must order everything out of Singapore, have to provision almost as far in advance as we of the Phoenix. Qantas employees, on the other hand, were receiving fresh fruits and vegetables and frozen meats by air twice a month, which made for a certain amount of envy on the part of the Exiles, who had to “make do with tinned goods.”
On the other hand, the Australians on West Island were envious of the luxurious standard of living enjoyed by C. & W., who could import Malay help from the Straits Settlements, a privilege Qantas did not accord to its employees, in conformity with the “whites only” policy of Australia. Furthermore, both groups felt a certain resentment against the benevolent dictatorship of John Clunies-Ross, from whom both Direction and West Islands were leased, because he would allow none of his natives to work for, or even to visit, the installations from which he derived profit.
It was also forbidden to set foot on Home Island, except by express invitation, which was rarely forthcoming. In the case of the Australians, in the wake of some unspecified incident, such an invitation was categorically denied. There was, however, some social interchange between Clunies-Ross and the C. & W. personnel, another cause for complaint.
As visitors, we were sought after by all three camps and exposed to all three points of view. We were careful not to take sides, but it did seem to us pitiful that, in such a remote and potentially peaceful paradise as Cocos, it was not possible to escape the discord and the rivalries of the outside world.
John Clunies-Ross and his wife were in England at the time of our visit, but we spent a most interesting day on Home Island at the invitation of the Keegans, caretakers and baby-sitters-in-residence to two-year-old Linda, the crown princess of the Cocos.