Part 16
"The years passed rapidly and tranquilly on Rimarutu. The days of Varana's activity were over; he was no longer young, though he kept his store and took the schooner out at long intervals for supplies. Then came the outbreak of the war.
"I was in Gallipoli when the letter reached me, written in the native language by Varana's old mate. It told a story fantastically unreal--incredible from the viewpoint of everyday life--and yet to me who knew him, as to the people of his island, the end of Varana seemed a natural thing, in keeping with what had gone before. Tupuna had fallen ill (the old man wrote) and had died suddenly and peacefully, as natives do. Varana stood beside her grave with no great display of grief, returned to his house and spent three days putting his affairs in order. On the fourth day he gave the mate a thick envelope of documents, called together the people of the island and bade each one of them farewell. When he turned to leave they did not disperse; the women had begun to sob--they felt already the desolation of a final parting. It was the hour of sunset, when the trade wind dies away and the lagoon lies like a mirror under an opalescent sky.... I can see in imagination those simple and friendly islanders, standing in little groups before the settlement--raising no voice in protest, moving no hand in restraint--while the man they loved walked to the ocean beach, launched a tiny canoe in the surf, and paddled out to the west. The nearest land in that direction is distant six hundred miles. When he had passed the breakers--they say--Varana did not once turn his head; the watchers stood motionless while the sky faded, their eyes fixed on the dot that was his canoe--a dwindling dot, swallowed up at last in the night."
Tari ceased to speak. He was sitting propped on the lounge, arms folded, legs stretched out, eyes staring at the table. Without seeming aware of what he did, he filled his glass, raised it to his lips, and drank. Presently he emerged from his revery to light a pipe.
"In due time," he went on, "I had word from the lawyers, inclosing a copy of the will and informing me that I had been named executor with old Jackson, who seemed to have discovered the secret of eternal life. There was also a letter from Varana, written after Tupuna's death--a friendly and casual note, with a mere line at the end, asking me to do what I could for his boy. The land Tupuna had brought him was to be divided equally among his daughters; all the rest was for Terii, saving his parting gift to me. Only one condition was attached--Terii must visit Rimarutu before inheriting the property of his father; once he had set foot on the island, he would be his own master, free to choose his path in life.
"The boy was nineteen when the war broke out; he joined up at once as a cadet in the Flying Corps. During the second year I began to hear of Lieutenant Warner--he had shot down a German plane near Zeebrugge; he had been wounded; he had received the Military cross. Once I saw his picture in the _Sphere_--a handsome lad, very smart in the old uniform of the R.F.C., with a jaunty cap over one eye and ribbons on his breast. This was the little savage whose shrill cries I used to hear at dawn, when he raced with his half-naked companions on the beach! At the end of the war he was Captain Terry Warner, a celebrity in a small way.... I felt a certain pride in him, of course. We had done our best to meet, but something always happened to prevent my getting a glimpse of him.
"I ran across him as I was homeward bound, leaving San Francisco for the islands. I had already gone aboard and was standing by the rail, watching the last of the luggage swing over the side in nets, when a motor drove up to discharge a party of men and women--fashionables of the city, from their looks. One of them, a lean, tanned boy, with the overcoat of a British officer over his civilian clothes, was saying good-by to the others, shaking hands and smiling very attractively. A little later, when the lines were being cast off, I saw him close beside me at the rail. A girl in blue was standing on the dock, waving up at him. 'Good-by, Terry!' she called. I looked closely; there could be no doubt--it was the son of Varana.
"We had long talks on the voyage south; the lad had not forgotten me. The memory of the old life--of the island, of his mother, of his father--would always be fresh in his mind, but he regarded those days as a distant and beautiful episode, now forever closed. He was going to visit Rimarutu for the last time--to bid farewell to those who remembered him. He had not forgotten the friends of his boyhood; there were many little presents in his boxes, and he told me that the schooner--reported sound as on the day of her launching--would be his gift to Varana's old mate. Afterward he would return to San Francisco, where opportunities had been offered him; he had brought letters to America and had been well received.
"The schooner was in port when we arrived. Varana's mate met us on the dock; there were tears in the old man's eyes as he took the boy's hands in his own and murmured in a trembling voice, '_O Terii iti e_.' The tourists descending the gangplank looked with interest at the spectacle of Captain Warner, almost embracing an old barefoot _kanaka_, dressed in dungarees and a faded shirt, wrinkled brown face working with emotion. As Terii shook hands with the crew--some of them boys with whom he had played in childhood--I noticed that a phrase or two of the native came to his lips--twelve years had not been sufficient to blot out all memory of his mother's tongue.
"We had a long passage south, beating against the trade; Varana had installed an engine in the schooner, but time is cheaper than petrol in this part of the world. Terii delighted in handling the boat; there was salt water in his blood; and his father had seen to his training in navigation and the ways of the sea. With each new day I perceived symptoms of a change in the boy. White suits and canvas slippers gave way to pajamas and bare feet; finally the pajamas were replaced by a _pareu_, taken from the trade-room stock. The summers at home had not been wasted; I used to watch him at the wheel, working the schooner to windward, an eye on the canvas aloft, steering with the easy certain movements of a seaman born. He was in love with the schooner before we had been out a week, and he had reason--Frisco-built for the last of the pelagic sealing, Varana's boat was the fastest thing of her tonnage in the South Seas. More than once in our talks Terii seemed to forget the plans he had confided to me.... She needed a new foresail; the set of this one did not please him; he was going to have her copper renewed in places; she was getting dingy below; the cabin needed a touch of paint. At times, speaking of these things, he stopped short in the midst of a sentence and changed the talk to other subjects. The language came back to him surprisingly; he was able to understand and make himself understood before we raised the palms of Rimarutu.
"The mate took her in through the pass. It was late afternoon, cool and cloudless, with a gentle sea nuzzling at the reef. The island was like the memory of a dream--fresh green palms, snowy beaches, cat's-paws ruffling the lagoon in long, blue streaks--so beautiful that the sight of it made one's heart ache and the breath catch in one's throat. A dozen canoes put out to meet us from the first settlement; there were greetings from friends and relatives--embraces and tears. Terii lay silent, propped on his elbows and staring ahead, as we slipped across the lagoon; the island people spoke in tones so low that I could hear the crisp sound of the schooner's bows parting the landlocked water. The other village lay beyond the beach ahead of us, Varana's village, where Terii had been born--a place of dreams in the mystery of the evening light. It was not difficult to guess at the boy's thoughts--the moment was one of those which make up the memories of a lifetime. Every man has known them--rapture, pain, the enjoyment of supreme beauty, the flavor of exotic and unrepeatable experience; but not every man is permitted to taste such contrasts as this boy had known in twenty-four years of life.... I was a little envious, I think, of the rarity of that poignant home-coming.
"On the first evening, when we had greeted the people of the village, Terii was led away by his old aunt, Tupuna's sister. Just before bedtime I saw them at his mother's grave--a lonely shrine, roofed over in island fashion, where the light of a lamp shone on stunted bushes of frangipani. My eccentricities were not forgotten; they had spread my mat under the palms before Varana's house, and toward midnight Terii came quietly and lay down close by. I was wakeful in a revery, living over the old days with my friend, wondering, with the usual idle and somber doubt, if we were destined to meet again. Low over the palm tops a planet glimmered like a shaded lamp; the Milky Way arched overhead through a sky powdered with fixed stars--remote suns, about which revolve myriads of worlds like ours.... I rebelled at the thought that the strong soul of Varana should be snuffed out. Terii said nothing for a long time; I thought he had dropped off to sleep, but suddenly I heard his voice: 'I have the strangest feeling to-night,' he said, thoughtfully; 'if my father were here I could believe that I had never been away, that everything since I left--England, school, my friends, the war--was no more than a dream. I can't explain to you, but somehow this island seems the most real thing in the world. I've been talking with my aunt--I'd almost forgotten her name, you know--and I managed to understand a good bit of what she had to say.... There is no doubt she believes it herself. My father comes to her every now and then, she says, for a talk on family matters; last night he told her we would come to-day, and that I would stop here to take his old place among the people. It seems they are good enough to want me to stay--I almost wish I could.' ...
"The drums were going at daybreak--the feast in Terii's honor was the greatest the island had known since heathen days. The entire population was on hand; the beach black with canoes; dozens of good-humored babies on mats under the trees, with small brothers and sisters stationed to fan the flies away. The people sat in long rows in the shade, strings of shell about their necks, their heads wreathed in hibiscus and sweet fern. Terii was placed between the chief of the other village and Tehina, the chief's daughter, a full-blooded Rimarutu girl of sixteen, barefoot, dressed in a white frock, with gold pendants in her ears and a thick, shining braid of hair. There is an uncommon charm about the women of that island--a stamp of refinement, a delicacy of frame and feature, remarked as long ago as the days of Spanish voyaging in the Pacific. Blood counts for something in Polynesia, and one needed only a glance at Tehina to know that the best blood of the island flowed in her veins; her ancestor--if tradition may be credited--was in the long canoe with Penipeni when the god pulled Rimarutu up from the bottom of the sea. I like those people, and in spite of the night's depression I managed to enjoy the fun--I even danced a bit! Finally I saw that the dancers were taking their seats; voices were lowered, heads were turned.
"Tehina was dancing alone to the rhythm of a hundred clapping hands. In twenty years of the islands I have never seen a girl step more daintily. Little by little she moved toward Terii until she stood directly before him, inviting him to dance, hands fluttering, swaying with an unconscious grace, smiling into his eyes. Every head turned; there were smiles, good-humored chuckles, nudges; they were proud of this girl and anxious that the son of Varana should dance with her. They had not long to wait. Next moment Terii had leaped to his feet and was dancing, with more enthusiasm than skill, to a long burst of cheers and clapping.
"When the canoes put off at nightfall I noticed that Tehina did not leave; she had stopped to visit her uncle, the parson of the village church. I saw Terii with her often during the days that followed--fishing on the lagoon, swimming in the cove, lying on mats in the moonlight where groups of young people were telling their interminable stories of the past. He seemed a little shy of me, and no longer exchanged confidences in the hour which precedes sleep. One evening, smoking and strolling alone after dinner, I passed the parson's house and became aware of the vague figure of Terii, walking to and fro impatiently beside the veranda. He stopped--I heard the rattle of a coral pebble on the roof. A moment later Tehina glided like a phantom around the corner of the house, and they went off arm in arm along the path to the sea. I thought to myself that the lad was not doing badly after his twelve years away from the island, but the blood was in him, of course--there was instinct in his manner of tossing the pebble and in the unhesitating way he had led the girl toward the outer beach: the haunt of dreadful presences, a place no ordinary islander would visit after dark. I fancied him sitting there--the rumble of the surf in his ears, watching the lines of breakers rear up under the moon--with Tehina beside him, admiring and afraid. When his eye was not on her she would glance right and left along the beach and back toward the bush, half expecting to see some monstrous thing, crouched and watching with fiery eyes. As for the boy, one could only guess at the troubled flow of his thoughts, stirred by cross-currents of ancestry and experience. In her own environment Tehina was a girl to make any man look twice; for him, with his mother's blood and the memories of his childhood, she must have possessed a powerful appeal--the touch of her hand; her voice, soft and low-pitched, murmuring the words of a half-forgotten tongue; her dark eyes shining in the moonlight; the scent of the strange blossoms in her hair. It was the test, the final conflict Varana had foreseen. I had my own opinion of the result, and yet the other life pulled hard.
"The days passed in pleasant island fashion; the loading of the schooner went on; there was no mention of a change in plans. The chief came to take his daughter home, and when she had gone Terii spoke to me, not too convincingly, of his return to civilization. My trip to Rimarutu was a matter of pleasure alone; I was already planning to take this berth, and was not sorry when Terii announced one morning that we would sail north that afternoon. One seems perpetually saying good-by down here--these islands are havens of a brief call, of sad farewells, of lingering and regretful memory. Our parting from the people of Rimarutu was more than usually painful; they had hoped to the last that Terii would leave some word, some promise; but he remained silent, though I could see that the leave-taking was not without effect.
"Finally the last canoe put off for shore; the anchor came up, the motor started, and Terii steered across the lagoon for the pass. The sails were still furled, for there was a light head wind. I watched his face as he stood in silence at the wheel; there was a look in his eyes which made me sorry for the boy. We crossed the lagoon, glided past green islets, and drew abreast of the other village. The people lined the shore, fluttering handkerchiefs, shouting good wishes and farewells.
"Beyond the settlement the pass led out, blue and deep, between sunken piers of coral, where the surf thundered in patches of white. All at once the old mate sang out and pointed--a dot was on the water ahead of us, a swimmer moving out from land to cut us off. The son of Varana turned the wheel; the schooner swung inshore; I heard a quick command and felt the speed of the engine slacken.
"Terii was staring ahead with a strange intensity--instinct or premonition was at work. I looked again as we drew near; a cloud of dark hair floated behind the swimmer's head; it was a woman--Tehina! Terii sprang to the rail. A moment later she had been lifted over the side and was standing beside him in the cockpit, dripping, trembling a little with cold and fear, doing her best to smile. The mate was pulling at Terii's arm and pointing back toward the village. A whaleboat had put out from shore and was heading for us at the top speed of the rowers; it was the chief himself, I believe, who stood in the stern and whose shouts were beginning to reach our ears.
"At that moment Terii proved that he was his father's son. He glanced back once, and then, without the smallest interval of hesitation, his arm went about the wet shoulder of Tehina.
"'Full speed ahead,' he ordered in a cool voice."
Tari poured rum into my glass, and tilted the last of the bottle into his own. The schooner was taking it easily with her engine at half speed, riding a gentle swell. The ship's bell rang twice, paused, and rang again--a sharp and mellow sound. It was long past midnight.
"If you ever get down to Rimarutu," said Tari, as he rose to go on deck, "you will find Terii there--he bids fair to leave the island even less than Varana did."
*CHAPTER XII*
*In the Cook Group*
I was close to beginning this letter with a little fun at your expense; you would have been mystified--perhaps convinced that my haunted friends of Ahu Ahu were just a bit uncanny. It is really a pity not to do it! I should have begun with a vivid glimpse of a seance; the quiet moonlight outside, seen through an open door; the glimmer of a turned-down lamp in the house, revealing the rapt sightless face of the medium; the summoning of old Rakamoana from her sleeping place in the _marae_; the unnatural voice proclaiming the coming of the spirit.
Then I would have told how a message from the visitor was announced--for the strange white man vouched for by the mother of Apakura. "I see an island," the ghostly voice might have gone on--"a little land surrounding a great lagoon. It is Nukuhina, in the far-off Sea of Atolls. A schooner lies at anchor in the calm water off the settlement; she does not move, for the lagoon is very still. A boat is putting off for shore, and in the stern sits a dear friend of the white man--a slender man, who gazes eagerly toward the shore with dark eyes like the eyes of our people. A crowd is gathered on the beach; the girls carry gifts of necklaces and wreaths; and in the village the old women are preparing a feast. The man in the boat believes that this welcome is for the captain of the schooner, not knowing that this people was once a race of warriors, and that they are gathered to give him welcome--the first soldier from the army of France to visit their island since the war. The keel of the boat grates on the sand; a score of men seize her to pull her up; the women crowd about the stranger (Aue! They are good to look upon these girls of Nukuhina!), to throw their necklaces over his head and crown him with wreaths of flowers and shell. His face grows red; the old men smile; the girls laugh aloud. One, bolder than the rest, runs at him suddenly, puts her arms about him, and kisses him after the fashion of the white man. His face grows redder still; at that, the old men, too, laugh aloud. One after another, pushing and pulling to be first, the girls scramble to kiss him; he is overwhelmed, suffocated, and now his face is like fire, but he is not angry, for he smiles."
Well, what do you think of Ahu Ahu magic? I really ought to refrain from telling you the truth, which--like the stuff of most spirit messages--is simple, unexpected, and disillusioning. When we got to Avarua I found S---- there, over from Tahiti to buy cattle; before his departure the _Alouette_ had turned up from the Paumotus, bringing word of your reception on Nukuhina.
I fancy you haven't had much time, in your progress through the Low Archipelago, for the pursuits of a landsman, so I'll give you an idea of how I've frittered away the days on Rarotonga.
Soon after our arrival there was a great stir over the coming of a shipload of parliamentary visitors from New Zealand, making a tour of the Cook Islands; a feast of welcome was to be given in Avarua, scores of pigs and hundreds of chickens were set aside for fattening, and the dancers of each village were to be seen rehearsing in the evenings. We drove to Avarua on the appointed day and found the government boat already anchored in the roadstead off the town--an anchorage dreaded by skippers, for unless the anchor strikes exactly on the summit of a sharp submerged peak, it will slide clean off soundings. Long before we reached the settlement the air had been vibrant with the sound of drums, the visitors were coming ashore, the dancing was in full swing.
The performance, of course, was a perfectly sophisticated one--like Papeete, Avarua is a small ocean metropolis, the capital of a group--but it interested me to see that the people, in spite of the efforts of the missionaries to make them ashamed of everything pertaining to heathen days, were not entirely without pride in the past. Each village was represented by a corps of dancers, men and women equally divided, and had its own drums and drummers, who furnished the sole music of the dance. The drums are of three varieties. The smallest are merely hollow sticks--six inches in diameter and a yard long--open on one side, and producing a loud, resonant click when struck with a bit of wood. There are others of medium size, standing on short legs and beaten with the hand, but the huge oldtime drums, suspended from the limbs of trees, interested me most of all. Imagine a five-foot section of the trunk of a big _Barringtonia_, carefully hollowed out and smoothed, with the skins of wild goats stretched over the ends, and sides decorated with outlandish painting.
The big drums are struck with the heel of the hand--with such furious energy that the drummer streams perspiration and is soon exhausted. The deep pulsing sound of them carries for miles in still air; sometimes at night, when there was dancing in the villages, I have heard it far and near, rising, falling, throbbing, from Arorangi, from Titikaveka, and from Ngatangiia, whence the ancients set out on their thousand-league voyages to the south.
I wish I could make you feel, as I have felt, the quality of this savage drumming. Monotonous and rhythmic sound, reduced almost to its simplest form, it is the ancestor of all music, toward which, perhaps, our modern dance music is a reversion. There is syncopation in it when the big drum halts at irregular intervals, and the time is carried by the clicking of hollow wood; but it is solemn and ominous--anything but the meretricious syncopation of ragtime. One feels in it an appeal to the primitive emotions, at once vague and charged with meaning; fear and madness are there, with cruelty, lust, triumph, and a savage melancholy.
Except in the case of the contingent from Manihiki--an atoll far off to the north--there was little variation in the dances, for which one can only say that they showed evidence of careful drilling. The women performed a variety of the dance common to all branches of their race**basically the same whether called _hula_, _hura_, or _ura_--but their motions were awkward and stiff, without the abandon and graceful movements of the arms to be seen in Hawaii or the Society Islands. The men, who carried long staves like spears, were freer in their motions, leaping, thrusting out their arms, and clattering their sticks in unison.