CHAPTER XXVI

The Weaving Hands of Fate in Mrs Matafa’s Knitted Shawl—Waylao tries to kill Herself—Snatched from Death—The Terrible Scourge—The Hulk disappears—The Compact of Death—The Lovers put off the Act Day by Day—A Ship comes in Sight—The Last Farewell of the Leper Lovers—The Last Sunset

AS the days went by, Waylao noticed a great change in her comrades’ manners. Their songs ceased, and they mostly sat whispering or praying together. One day as she sat beneath the palms by the shore, dreaming of the past, the Hawaiian chief came up to her and said: “Waylao, we are sorely troubled. We know that but for us you might have been rescued, and been taken back to your people.” Saying this, the chief looked steadily at Waylao, who replied:

“But I do not wish to leave you. Should I be taken from this isle, and know that you were left here alone, to die, I should never be happy again.”

The Hawaiian maid, who had crept up whilst her lover was speaking, heard all that Waylao said, and was deeply touched. But they both quickly responded as though with one voice: “We must not allow you to sacrifice your life for our sake; we are sure to die, then it will be _you_ who will be left here alone.” Without saying another word, the chief went out to the palm-tree that grew on the most distant point of the promontory, climbed the highest tree and fixed old Mrs Matafa’s knitted shawl on the topmost bough. There it waved, flying to the breeze of that silent sea, the token of Mrs Matafa’s kindness, flapping violently as its knitted folds called to the illimitable sky-lines for help.

Waylao was too wretched to resist the wishes of the lepers. She knew that the terrors of death were upon the beautiful Hawaiian maid Aiola, for only the night before she had heard the maid say, as she clung to the chief: “We must die! We must die, O Le Haiwa-oe! Promise that I am dead ere mine eyes are dull!” And the chief promised.

“Beloved,” he said, “your eyes are still beautiful.” But as he gazed his heart was stricken with anguish. For the terrible sight was there before his gaze: the maid’s eyes were bulged and shining like glass in consequence of the terrible scourge.

They made Waylao sleep alone. “You will surely catch the leprosy if you sleep near us,” they said. So as the wind blew through the coco-palms all night, and the waves tossed up the shore, Waylao tossed sleeplessly. She could hear the Hawaiian girl moaning through the night in her sleep: “O my beloved, kill me! Kill me! My eyes! My eyes!”

Next day, when Waylao thought she was unobserved, she crept out to the edge of the promontory. There was no wind. The sea was like a mighty sheet of glass. Only one or two waves, at long intervals, crept in from the swell, to break sparkling on the sun-lit sand.

In a few seconds she had tied a large bit of rock coral on to the string that she held secretly in her hand. This string she tied again to her waist, then, with a prayer on her lips, she dived noiselessly into the deep, clear water—and disappeared in the depths.

The Hawaiian chief by the merest chance saw Waylao’s head disappear beneath the calm surface. He rushed out to the promontory’s edge and tried to locate the spot where the girl had sunk. As the ripples widened, he peered below the glassy surface and distinctly saw Waylao’s figure as it lay on the sandy bottom. Her uplifted face and swaying limbs were as visible as though she were lying encased in a mirror. Even the lump of coral that she had tied to her waist was visible; he saw her dying efforts to dislodge the string from her body. In a moment he had dived, clutched the girl and brought her to the surface—coral and all. “Waylao, you would leave us alone to sorrow over your death. Have we not sorrowed enough?”

So did he speak as Waylao opened her eyes and gazed into those of her rescuer.

“Forgive me, I longed to die,” she cried, as Aiola, the Hawaiian girl, opened her bodice to chafe her breast.

“Kilia!” (leprosy) cried the Hawaiian maid as she rubbed Waylao’s bosom and the skin all peeled softly off on to her hand—Waylao had contracted the plague, she too was a leper.

Instead of the Marquesan girl being worried over the discovery, she looked into the eyes of her friends and smiled. For the thought came to her that they were now true comrades in grief.

On the following night a terrible typhoon blew. The thundering seas seemed to make some tremendous effort to wash the little isle into the ocean depths. The bending pines and palms moaned so loudly that it kept the castaways awake all night, as they sat by the cavern’s doorway together. It was this night that the chief came to Waylao and said:

“O maid, though you have got kilia, you may live for many years, so, should a sail come in sight, they must see the distress signal. You will then be able to go away and see your people before you die.”

Waylao hung her head with grief, and as Aiola tried to soothe her, once more the chief put up the signal, which he had taken down at Waylao’s request.

“Cannot I stay and die with you, Aiola?” Waylao replied.

“No; because you know not our plans. We have decided to die together. How can we die and know in our hearts that you will be left alone on this isle?”

Saying this, the Hawaiian girl took Waylao’s hand, kissed it, and said: “If you love us, do as we wish.”

Then the two castaway girls embraced each other, cried in each other’s arms and slept no more that night.

In the morning the sea had calmed; the typhoon had blown itself out as swiftly as it had blown itself in.

As the day broadened, and the golden streams of fire imparadised the eastern horizon, the three castaways stood on the beach and stared: the old hulk, that had been high and dry on the beach facing their cavern home, had disappeared. The wild night seas had dislodged it from the reef and washed it away. As they stared across the brightening waters they saw the hulk adrift, far off. All day long they watched it. At sunset it faded on the horizon to the south-west. As it died from their sight their hearts became heavy. Though it was only an insensate hulk, it somehow faded away like a dear old friend, something that was the last link between them all and the world that they had left for ever.

A few days later the chief came to Aiola and said:

“The distress signal still flies on the highest point. Our friend will be saved some day.” Saying this, he looked into the sad eyes of the Hawaiian girl. She returned the gaze steadily: she knew what he meant, but did not flinch.

The chief’s voice was hoarse and had the note of intense sorrow in it. The leper girl stood up on tiptoe, kissed his shoulder, and said:

“Beloved, I know how your heart feels, but remember that ’tis my wish that we go to the great Lani [Heaven] together.”

The chief answered not, but sat perfectly still and gazed upon the maid who still revealed the wild beauty of her race. She peered back into her lover’s eyes. Crimson flowers to please his eyes bedecked the tresses of her wind-blown hair. The tropic breezes stirred the rich-hued masses as they fell to her smooth breast in curling waves. The silken tappa blouse was torn, and revealed the curves of her smooth shoulders, that were as perfect and brown as a nightingale’s eggs.

“My beloved, kiss me,” whispered the maid as she looked up into his eyes.

The chief did not answer. Perhaps he was thinking of the past, for he had known Aiola since she was a little child. The eventide was fast falling—yes, the hour when the girl would cling to him and pass away into the shadows of the great Unknown.

As sunset flooded the seas, and the shadows fell over the small island world, he looked into Aiola’s eyes and said: “Come!”

For a moment the two Hawaiians stood side by side, and looked over their shoulders at Waylao, who sat on the promontory’s edge, ignorant that the terrible moment had arrived.

“Aiola, hesitate not, come into the cave,” said the chief. Then they both crept into the cave, and kneeling side by side prayed, saying: “Ora li Jesu” (the Lord’s Prayer). Then they peered into each other’s eyes as though for the last time; and the brave Hawaiian maid said: “Strike!”

The chief held the blade aloft and gave one longing look into the eyes of the girl that he loved. He could not strike. So they fell into each other’s arms and kissed again—and put it off till the next night.

So did they each night prepare to die; and each night his heart failed him. Then, alas! one day a sail appeared on the horizon.

Waylao was the first to see the white glimmer, sparkling like a beautiful bird’s wing far to the north-west.

She tried to distract the chief’s attention. But it was no good: his keen eyes discerned it.

Nearer and nearer came the sail. The Hawaiian chief undid the old Samoan’s woman’s shawl and placed it on a tree a little more to the south of the isle. Then they all watched. At first it seemed as though the schooner was dipping away across the sea straight on its course. Suddenly the sails, on fire with the light of the sunset, swerved, and the golden and crimson fire touched the other side of the spread canvas, that had been a dull grey, and they knew the schooner had sighted the signal of distress and was beating its way towards the solitary isle.

“Hide me, I don’t want to go away from you, don’t leave me!” screamed Waylao.

It was no good. The Hawaiian chief looked at her sternly but kindly.

And Waylao knew that she appealed in vain.

The Hawaiian turned his head away to hide his tears. Fate had given him a task which he hated to perform.

Aiola, who stood watching the approaching schooner, called out in a beseeching voice: “Waylao, let us die!”

As Waylao gazed at the girl, pleading so strangely for the hand of Death to strike, her heart stood still. For Aiola had hidden herself for several days. Why? Her eyes goggled and stared like bulged glass, and as the Hawaiian chief turned and looked at her she hung her head for shame. The shoulders that he had so often praised for their smooth, graceful beauty were spotted and disfigured.

Waylao followed the chief, obediently, like a child, as he led her to say the last good-bye.

The two girls embraced and sobbed in each other’s arms. Then they all knelt together and prayed.

Nearer and nearer came the schooner.

The chief was the first to rise.

“Waylao, go down to the shore and wait till I call you.” Saying this, he stooped and kissed Waylao on the brow, and murmured something in a strange tongue.

Waylao went down to the shore, walking like one in dream.

The Hawaiian chief took hold of his beloved one by the arm, and led her into the cavern.

Before they entered the silent place that was to be their tomb, they both looked over their shoulders into the light of their last sunset. Then they swiftly embraced; their lips met; they murmured “Aloha!” into each other’s very souls.

The knife flashed silently, then the same blade flashed again and went straight to the Hawaiian chief’s heart also.

Waylao, who stood on the shore watching the dipping bows of the schooner that came towards the isle, suddenly recovered her senses.

“Aiola! Aiola! Come to me!” she screamed. In the terror of the silence that answered her despairing cry she rushed up the shore into the cavern. Once inside, she stood bathed in the light of the setting sun streaming through that hollow doorway. The sight that met her eyes transfixed her with horror.

Even the sailors on the schooner’s deck heard that terrified shriek. Then she ran down to the shore and fell prostrate on to the sands.

Thus was Waylao saved from the sea and brought back to her native isle to die.

* * * * *

Such was the terrible story Waylao told Father O’Leary in my presence. I cannot describe the sorrow that shone in her eyes, as through the hours we listened. I recall how the priest held her in his arms as though she were his own erring daughter, and laid her trembling form on the mission couch. Though we could hear the wild songs and oaths of the very crew who had brought her on their ship from that leper isle, no one in the world knew the truth of the secret that Father O’Leary and I guarded in the mission-room.

For three days she lay there, in that little room that she had so often dusted for the kind priest.

It was on the third day that she left us for ever, the victim of a tragedy that had left her a dying wreck at seventeen years of age.

I was obliged to clear out of that mission-room when the priest murmured prayers by the coffin. I felt too weak and sick at heart to watch that Calvary of stricken hopes and aspirations—betrayed by the Judas of hypocritical manhood.

I hated to see the world so beautiful outside, as she slept on. The mano-bird was singing in the banyans, the sunset fired the seas, and from far came the sounds of drums that were beating the stars in up in the mountain villages.

It was now that the Father went on his knees by that silent form for the last time. It all seemed unreal to me, as he took the image of the Virgin, softly pulled back the folds of the shroud and laid it on the dead girl’s bosom. In that moment we both noticed the livid leprosy patch on the breast of the sleeping girl.

The Father quickly fastened the shroud folds together again. I believe trouble would have come to him had he been known to conceal a leper. Then he called softly—in they came, three hired men. They were rough-looking, almost villainous types, but even they looked deeply on that silent form ere they stooped and nailed the lid down—and hid her face for ever from the sight of men.

That same night I sat in the forest quite alone, like one in a dream. I think I must have slept beneath the silence of those giant bread-fruit trees that moaned sorrowfully over me as the wind swept in from the dark seas. Though I felt some strange fright at my heart, I felt glad as Pauline crept out of the cloistered shadows.

“I’m pleased you’ve come at last,” I said as I commenced to play a wondrous melody on my violin.

Her eyes seemed unearthly bright as she suddenly sprang into my arms. It was so unexpected. She was as cold as death and trembling.

“I shall come again,” she said.

“Must you go?” I responded, nothing seeming strange near Tai-o-hae.

My voice sounded a long way off. As I spoke, the pale brow, the beautiful mass of hair became shadowy, dim and visionary. Only the transcendent gleam of the blue eyes stared through the dark of my dream.

I put forth my arms and endeavoured to grasp her, but she had vanished. It was then that I knew ’twas but another mad dream of mine.

EPILOGUE

Hark! o’er the wild shore reefs the seas are leaping, The clamouring white-armed waves come in and go; The wind along the waste, with voice unsleeping, Has that about its cry that all men know Who ghost-like from themselves steal far away To hearth-fires, dead sunset—of Yesterday!

OUT of the night the dawn came creeping over the ranges like a maiden with her sandals dipped in light, the glory of the stars fading in her hair as she stood on the brightening clouds of the eastern mountain peaks of Nuka Hiva, and with her golden bugle of silence she blew transcendent streaks of crimson along the grey horizon—to awaken the day.

The sounds of the natives beating their drums aroused the echoes of the hills.

“Wailo oooe! wailo ooooeeee!” called some nameless bird from the forest shadows where now the last of the Marquesan race sleep by their beloved seas.

The harbour was silent. Not an oath echoed from the grog shanty. The traders and sailormen still slept. I could not sleep. As I stood by the shore-sheds it seemed impossible that such tragedy should live in such beautiful surroundings. I was not sorry that I had secured a berth on the s.s. ——, a three-masted ship anchored out in the bay. She was due to sail on the Saturday morning, so I still had three more days in Nuka Hiva.

All the familiar faces had gone. News came in the Apia _Times_ that the _Bell Bird_ schooner had gone down in a typhoon, lost with all hands off Savaii Isle. The only evidence that the crew ever existed were several small, dark spots sighted by a passing ship’s skipper, fading away on the sky-line—the old peaked and oilskin caps of my old shellbacks drifting away on the waste of waters, travelling N.N.W.

The Hebrew prophet might well have spoken of such a place as that wooden grog bar of Tai-o-hae when he said: “One generation passeth away and another cometh. Only the mountains abideth for ever.” Ah, Koheleth, your wisdom was the wisdom of truth. The sun sets and rises again, the winds blow eternally on appointed courses; the river flows to the sea; but whither shall I go? And where is he who went away ten thousand years ago?

Not only in the South Seas will you hear of the tragedy of Waylao. She is at your door wailing—if you have eyes to see and ears to hear. She walks the ghostly London streets by night, calling for her lost lover. And one may pass her nameless grave wherever the dead are buried.

Perhaps my pages smack too much of sorrow; but I would say that even our sorrows are too brief. Life itself is little more than this:

A man and a woman awoke in the hills of Time.

“How beautiful is the sun that I see,” said the man, after admiring the beauty of the woman who had so mysteriously appeared before him. Still the man stared at the sun, but so brief was his existence that, when he turned to gaze once more on the glory of the woman beside him, she had wrinkled up to a wraith of skin and bone.

“What is this terrible thing that has happened?” he said, as he wept to see so terrible a change in that which he loved. “What have I done?” he moaned.

Then the woman wept and said: “You too have altered since you turned your face to the sun; it is wrinkled, and your cheeks look like the cheeks of that big toad.”

Hearing this, the man rushed off into the forest and prayed to his shadow in the lake, thinking it was Omnipotence!

Rushing back to see if his prayer had been answered, he saw a little heap of dust: it was all that was left of the beautiful woman. He shouted his hatred to the sky, then he fell prostrate and prayed fervently, and then—he was struck deaf, dumb and blind; and only the sun laughed over the hills again so that the flowers could blossom over their dust.

So one will see that it is natural that sorrow as well as rum and wild song should reign in Tai-o-hae.

When I went to say good-bye to the old priest, I was astonished to see the change in him. But I must confess that I was more astonished when he gazed steadily at me and said:

“My son, I have discovered the great secret. We are both nearer the sorrow of Calvary and the joy of Paradise than I ever dreamed!”

Saying this, the old man took my hand, and said in his rich, musical voice, that strangely thrilled me: “Come!”

In wonder I followed him beneath the palms.

As we passed down into the hollows, the sea-gulls swept swiftly away from the surfaces of the hidden lagoons, their wild cries sounding like the ghostly echoes of bugles.

The priest led me up the tiny track that led to the path by the mountains, not far from the cross-roads that led to the calaboose of Nuke Hiva. I began to wonder what on earth it could all mean, for the old priest had a strange look on his face and was running his fingers through his beads.

Suddenly he turned to me and said, in a cracked voice: “My son, lift thine eyes, and breathe the hallowed name of Him who died for sinners.”

I made a mighty effort and obeyed. After I had looked up at the sky with due decorum, he looked stealthily around him, and said in a tense whisper: “My son, to think I have dwelt so near and never known.”

“Known what, Father?” I ejaculated, my heart full of wonder. (I noticed that his eyes were unearthly bright.)

“My son,” he said, in a hushed voice, “it is here where our Lord Jesus Christ died! I have discovered the remains of the old Cross!”

“No! Never!” I ejaculated, as he fell on his knees and lifted up a large lump of grey coral stone. I admit that it looked like the remnant of some tomb’s edifice. Under the influence of the Father’s earnest manner I was thrilled with curious wonder as I stared at the lump of stone. My belief at that moment was as firm as the rock that the priest still held.

“’Tis the very stone, the cross that our Redeemer was crucified upon,” said he, as he stared at me.

“How did it come here, all the way from Jerusalem?” I said, in a hushed voice, as I gazed on the sacred relic.

“I know not, my son, but there it is. Canst thou not see it with thine own eyes?”

“Assuredly I can, Father,” I murmured, as I looked at that old stone, and thought how like an ordinary cross stone off a mortal’s grave it seemed. True enough, the cemetery was close by, the spot where they buried sad, home-sick men, women and children—and did _she_ not lie there, the dead convict girl?

I took the Father’s hand and led him away. I called a native woman who passed to take his other arm. He was old and tremulous, and I saw the truth.

“So that’s the end of all your life’s self-sacrifice, your reward,” I muttered to myself as we led the demented old man away.

That night the natives in the village hard by the mission-room could not sleep, neither could I, as the Father lay calling out wild prayers to the silent night, and strange names echoed in his room. That’s almost the last I saw, or rather heard, of him.

My last visit in Tai-o-hae was to a place that anyone may go and see to this very day. For the little track that lies north-west of the bay leads suddenly upon a little plateau by Calaboose Hill. It is a lonely spot, sheltered on one side by coco-palms and a few bread-fruit trees. It is half fenced in by rough wooden railing. Across its hollows are many piles of earth and stones. Old-time chiefs and missing white men sleep there. Jungle grass and hibiscus blossoms almost hide the cross where Waylao sleeps, and not so far away Pauline also lies at rest.

It was night when I last stood there—the winds seemed to strike the giant bread-fruits with a frightened breath. Far away the ocean winds were lifting the seas in their arms beneath the stars, till the ocean looked like some mighty hissing cauldron of thwarted desires.

I could just hear faintly the echoes of wild song coming in from a ship in the bay, and from the new generation of shellbacks in the grog shanty.

It’s years since I packed up my traps and sailed away from Tai-o-hae. I called in at Samoa and saw the Matafas. When I had told them the history and end of Waylao and Tamafanga, they both laid their old heads on the hut table and cried like two children.

No wonder I love heathens and hate the memory of Mr and Mrs Christian Pink, of Suva township.

And what is the moral of the foregoing reminiscences and impressions? The moral will be understood or ignored according to the temperament of the reader. Some will sneer, and some will understand and feel as I have felt. I’m sure to find good company among many; I’ve travelled the world and met many of my own type. I’m common enough, thank God.

“A thing of beauty is a joy for ever,” said the poet. So is sorrow. Nothing really dies; it’s all the same as it was long before, in some new form being washed in again by the tide. The bird that sings to us to-day sang to the reapers in the corn-fields of Assyria. I dare say that I helped to build the Pyramids.

Is Grimes dead? No! He lives to-day, buckles on his armour, and with a grim, brave look in his English eyes goes forth to battle, that the helpless may live.

And Pauline? She still sings of England to exiled men, wherever Waylao has wept for her race in the savage, ravished South.

I often hear their old songs as the winds and birds sing in the windy poplars, in the green woods and English fields. I never go forth in the summer nights but I can hear her shadow-feet pattering down the dusky lanes beside me, and the sweetest songs of far-off romance echo in my ears. Ah! could I catch the beauty of those songs, what a composer would I be. But I can only write down the spindrift of those glorious strains.

I often sit dreaming far into the night. It is then that she comes back from the shadows and kneels with me at the altar of my dreams—and sings some far-off strain of my beautiful, dead Romance.

● Transcriber’s Notes: ○ Music files have been provided for the song presented on page 18, “On yonder high mountain.” If your browser supports it, clicking on the MP3 link will play the piano music; clicking on the MIDI link may open a program that can play MIDI files; and clicking on the Music XML link may download the MXL file to your computer. The music will probably not play in a device that uses ePub format or on a Kindle. ○ Missing or obscured punctuation was silently corrected. ○ Typographical errors were silently corrected. ○ Inconsistent spelling and hyphenation were made consistent only when a predominant form was found in this book. ○ Text that was in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_).