PART II
CHAPTER X
AN ISLAND HONEYMOON
One day Dick climbed on to the tree above the house, and, drivingMadame Koko off the nest upon which she was sitting, peeped in. Therewere several pale green eggs in it. He did not disturb them, butclimbed down again, and the bird resumed her seat as if nothing hadhappened. Such an occurrence would have terrified a bird used to theways of men, but here the birds were so fearless and so full ofconfidence that often they would follow Emmeline in the wood, flyingfrom branch to branch, peering at her through the leaves, lightingquite close to her—once, even, on her shoulder.
The days passed. Dick had lost his restlessness: his wish to wander hadvanished. He had no reason to wander; perhaps that was the reason why.In all the broad earth he could not have found anything more desirablethan what he had.
Instead now of finding a half-naked savage followed dog-like by hismate, you would have found of an evening a pair of lovers wandering onthe reef. They had in a pathetic sort of way attempted to adorn thehouse with a blue flowering creeper taken from the wood and trainedover the entrance.
Emmeline, up to this, had mostly done the cooking, such as it was; Dickhelped her now, always. He talked to her no longer in short sentencesflung out as if to a dog; and she, almost losing the strange reservethat had clung to her from childhood, half showed him her mind. It wasa curious mind: the mind of a dreamer, almost the mind of a poet. TheCluricaunes dwelt there, and vague shapes born of things she had heardabout or dreamt of: she had thoughts about the sea and stars, theflowers and birds.
Dick would listen to her as she talked, as a man might listen to thesound of a rivulet. His practical mind could take no share in thedreams of his other half, but her conversation pleased him.
He would look at her for a long time together, absorbed in thought. Hewas admiring her.
Her hair, blue-black and glossy, tangled him in its meshes; he wouldstroke it, so to speak, with his eyes, and then pull her close to himand bury his face in it; the smell of it was intoxicating. He breathedher as one does the perfume of a rose.
Her ears were small, and like little white shells. He would take onebetween finger and thumb and play with it as if it were a toy, pullingat the lobe of it, or trying to flatten out the curved part. Herbreasts, her shoulders, her knees, her little feet, every bit of her,he would examine and play with and kiss. She would lie and let him,seeming absorbed in some far-away thought, of which he was the object,then all at once her arms would go round him. All this used to go on inthe broad light of day, under the shadow of the artu leaves, with noone to watch except the bright-eyed birds in the leaves above.
Not all their time would be spent in this fashion. Dick was just askeen after the fish. He dug up with a spade—improvised from one of theboards of the dinghy—a space of soft earth near the taro patch andplanted the seeds of melons he found in the wood; he rethatched thehouse. They were, in short, as busy as they could be in such a climate,but love-making would come on them in fits, and then everything wouldbe forgotten. Just as one revisits some spot to renew the memory of apainful or pleasant experience received there, they would return to thevalley of the idol and spend a whole afternoon in its shade. Theabsolute happiness of wandering through the woods together, discoveringnew flowers, getting lost, and finding their way again, was a thingbeyond expression.
Dick had suddenly stumbled upon Love. His courtship had lasted onlysome twenty minutes; it was being gone over again now, and extended.
One day, hearing a curious noise from the tree above the house, heclimbed it. The noise came from the nest, which had been temporarilyleft by the mother bird. It was a gasping, wheezing sound, and it camefrom four wide-open beaks, so anxious to be fed that one could almostsee into the very crops of the owners. They were Koko’s children. Inanother year each of those ugly downy things would, if permitted tolive, be a beautiful sapphire-coloured bird with a few dove-colouredtail feathers, coral beak, and bright, intelligent eyes. A few days agoeach of these things was imprisoned in a pale green egg. A month agothey were nowhere.
Something hit Dick on the cheek. It was the mother bird returned withfood for the young ones. Dick drew his head aside, and she proceededwithout more ado to fill their crops.