The coincidence had surprised neither of them. This was not a country in which anything could surprise.
“He thinks you are dead,” said William. “He found your deserted huts, with bloodstains on the walls.”
“I was as near dead as makes no difference,” said Tai Haruru. “All my men were killed, and I got this head wound whose scar you can see, and they battered my body nearly to pulp with their clubs. We’d gone too far, you see. Traveling from the north from the Bay of Plenty, making southwest through the forest, we’d passed without knowing it beyond the frontiers of the Maori kingdom. We were cutting down trees in their sacred stronghold, which is forbidden. They surprised us by night and carried our bodies away with them, to eat the flesh and stick the heads on stakes to decorate their pa. But when they found the life was still in me, they kept me alive. God knows why. They liked the look of me, perhaps. They take strong likes and dislikes, as children do. Later they found me useful, for I’ve power in my hands; there’s nothing I can’t make, and I can heal pain with the touch of them. I lived with them for years, as I told you. I had been badly injured. I was a sick man and lacked the energy to escape. Also I liked them. They have great courage and a fine courtesy. The only thing I had against them was their lust to kill and mutilate. Even the women, mourning the dead, will cut themselves up with sharp stones, so that a whole lovely young body becomes a pillar of dripping blood. Their belief in the fairy tale of immortality leads them to outdo the most horrible of religious mystics in their disregard of the exquisite beauty of the living clay. This disregard did violence to the best that is in me. In the end I couldn’t stand it. I left them, crossed their frontier by night, traveling westward, and came back to what passes for civilization in this primordial land. Civilization, boy, according to my interpretation of it, is another word for respect for life. One can’t have too much respect for a loveliness that’s brittle as spun glass.”
Samuel would have put that the other way round, William thought; you can’t have too much respect for a thing whose tough fiber is the stuff of immortality. Though he felt far nearer in spirit to Tai Haruru than he did to the little parson, he yet preferred Samuel’s more invigorating faith. Tai Haruru laughed suddenly and clapped him on the shoulder. “Cheer up, boy. I’m not the only man who lives yonder. You’ll find men after your own heart down there to laugh and drink with. Eat, drink, and be merry is their motto, and it’s only Tai Haruru who remembers that tomorrow we die.”
Two men were running up the hill to meet them. Their beautiful, half naked bodies were light brown, their hair auburn; both skin and hair seeming to absorb the last of the sunset light and to give it out in a warm glow of welcome. They had bright feathers stuck in their heads that burned like tongues of flame, and they ran both fast and fearlessly.
“Jacky-Poto, and Kapua-Manga the Black Cloud,” said Tai Haruru. “They are my friends and will be yours if you always speak courteously, always keep your word, and never show fear before them. If you can do that, then your mana will always be high with them. Mana is an untranslatable word. Prestige is the nearest one can get to it. But it’s an important word in this country. When you lose your mana, there’s no hope for you.”
“Maoris?” gasped William. “I thought they would be black!”
“The Maori rangatira, the true gentleman, is no more black than you are,” laughed Tai Haruru. “He comes of the same racial stock as yourself, and you will feel at home with him. He’s not an alien creature, like the Chink or the Jap. Haere mai, Jacky-Poto! Haere mai, Kapua-Manga!”
It was very nearly dark now, and the stars burned in the green sky. The bodies of the runners no longer held the light, but their answering cry of welcome came clear and strong out of the shadows: “Haere mai! Haere mai!”
That was all right, thought William. That was the genuine cry of his own country.
Part 2 The Green Dolphin
Whither, O splendid ship, thy white sails crowding,
Leaning across the bosom of the urgent West,
That fearest nor sea rising, nor sky clouding,
Whither away, fair rover, and what thy quest?
ROBERT BRIDGES.
Chapter I
1
The April wind flung a shower of bright raindrops against the window. The sun was hidden and then gleamed again; there must be a rainbow somewhere, though Marguerite could not see it from her bedroom window, where she sat darning her best petticoat with meticulous care. She was now twenty-seven years old, and she had become a less clumsy darner than she had been in her youth. She enjoyed sewing now, for the reason that it gave her the opportunity and the excuse for being alone in her room. She and Marianne no longer shared the same room; she had their old bedroom looking on the street, and Marianne the schoolroom looking toward the sea. Marianne had made this arrangement. To look out upon the sea was to her what solitude was to Marguerite: a way of escape, a relaxation that she deserved and Marguerite did not.
For Marianne, ceaselessly busy from morning till night with good works and social duties, gave it as her opinion that Marguerite was frivolous-minded, selfish, and abominably lazy. It was true that she visited the poor occasionally, but according to Marianne her visits were entirely useless because she never could find anything of an improving nature to say, and her rare attendances at dinner parties were rendered equally futile, by her apparent inability to make any attempt whatever to be an uplifting intellectual influence in Island society. She seemed to her sister to be devoid of any sense of the duties incumbent upon her owing to her superior advantages of breeding and education. She seemed unaware, even, of the basic fact of her superiority. When she visited an Island cottage with Marianne, her laughter as she sat on the floor and played with the children, or returned with gusto the unrefined winks of some old bedridden grandfather whose thoughts should have been upon his latter end and not upon pretty young women, completely distracted the attention of the whole family from the earnest remonstrances and good advice doled out by Marianne. And in society it was the same. Though her beauty gave her great power over the susceptible hearts of young men, her conversation with them at the dinner table seemed generally to be upon the subject of crabs and bait rather than upon general reading or Lord Palmerston’s latest oration in Parliament. And at home, too, Marianne considered that Marguerite was light-minded and idle. Certainly she was her mother’s unfailingly loving companion in those boring and entirely unnecessary domestic activities to which Sophie with increasing age was tending to attach more and more importance, such as the washing of china that was already perfectly clean and the re-tidying of boxes of lace that were already perfectly tidy, a method of wasting time that Marianne considered should by no means be encouraged. Also she would read the sporting news aloud by the hour together to Octavius, whose sight was failing and his temper with it, a daughterly duty that Marianne herself felt incapable of undertaking, so insulted was her intellect by Octavius’ low taste in literature. But these services once performed, Marguerite made no attempt to do anything useful; she went selfishly to her room and lazed.
Was she really as useless as Marianne thought her, wondered Marguerite this morning? She thought that she was not. She knew that in the eyes of the world her life must seem a very trivial thing, just a passing of the time somehow by a woman whose first youth had passed away without her having been able to lay hands upon the blessed employment that the care of husband and children would have given her, but she knew also that what the world sees of the life of any human creature is not the real life; that life is lived in secret, a reality that moves behind the facade of appearance, like wind behind a painted curtain; only an occasional ripple of the surface, a smile, a sudden light or shadow passing on a face, surprising by its unexpectedness, gives news of something quite other than what is seen. And Marguerite believed that her real life was of value, besides being an immense joy to herself. She assured herself that the practice of the presence
of God, that she had learned with self-discipline of thought and will, was not a selfish thing but something absolutely essential if one’s soul was to be of the slightest use. This faith had come to her from the book Reverend Mother had given her on that faraway day of her childhood, that she had picked up and for the first time read with attention soon after William had left the Island, a book of letters written by a barefoot Carmelite brother nearly two centuries ago. Like Brother Lawrence, she had learned by bitter experience that “useless thoughts spoil all”; she had learned to silence the chatter of self, to focus her mind in meditation, until the beauty dwelt upon became not a picture but an opening door.
During the hours that she spent with her mother, washing clean china and sorting tidy lace, she could feel the strength ebb from her to Sophie, who was frightened now because Octavius was going blind and she herself had a sharp and alarming pain in her chest after eating roast beef, and because her life had reached the crest of the hill and now was going down, and old age and death did not strike her as things she could possibly face; unless she happened to be sitting with Marguerite, in whose presence, for some reason or other, all fears seemed to melt away. And it was the same with Octavius, even more unhappy than Sophie upon the shadowed side of the hill because he had always believed himself invulnerable to disaster, and if blindness could happen to Octavius Le Patourel, the best fellow who ever lived, then either he was not the fellow he had thought he was, or else the Deity was not the discerning being in whom he had believed. He was between the Scylla and Charybdis of humiliation or apostasy, tipping this way and that between them, and most uncomfortably dizzy; except when Marguerite was reading the sporting news to him and from the very tones of her voice he caught a queer unexplainable sense of balance.
There were times when she felt the comforter in her cross the barriers of time and space and reach even to William. She would pray for him then, as she prayed for all whom she loved, on and on with determined persistence, until words died in her and she felt her soul lift itself up in speechless adoration, and then she would say to herself with gleeful satisfaction that her prayer was answered. She alone of those who loved him upon the Island believed him to be still alive. No letter had ever come from him. The last they knew of him had been his disappearance in China, and it was natural that everyone should think him dead. But she knew that he was still in this world, and still thought of her. That bond that had always been between them still held. Whenever she felt the pull of it, she gave herself to the thought of him with all the strength that she had, and it was for fear of breaking this union that she had chosen to remain unmarried; tenuous though it might be, she knew it was more valuable to her than the bodily satisfaction and protection of marriage that she did at times most desperately long for. She never forgot the moment in William’s arms on the rock of Le Petit Aiguillon, or the other moment standing beside him on board the Orion when her soul had seemed to recognize him as a tried friend known centuries ago. In his arms only would she find her earthly riches and her shelter; or go poor and storm-beaten all the days of her life.
But with Marianne, she realized, it was not so. Marianne believed William to be dead, and now that the period of her bitter grief had ended, she could pose to herself and the world as a woman who had been separated from the man she loved by death, not by his indifference, and so could turn without diminution of her pride, to the second best she had hitherto scorned, but that her passionate nature demanded now for the salvation of her thwarted womanhood. Only, the second best was not now forthcoming. She had aged and hardened, once she had made up her mind that William was dead. There was nothing that Marguerite would not have done for her sister, but it was not in her power to preserve her youth, or to hand on to her her own rejected lovers.
There was a sudden rattle of wheels over the cobblestones, and the Le Patourel chariot drew up with a flourish at the front door below Marguerite’s window. Pierre only drove with a flourish like that when Marianne was inside; it was his quite unconscious tribute to her style and pride. Marguerite stood up to wave to her sister. Marianne was returning from a meeting of the Island Gentlewomen’s Mutual Improvement Society, of which she was president. She would have made a fine improving speech and worn a new gown, both of her own designing, and would have dazzled the society equally with both.
Pierre flung open the chariot door and Marianne stepped out. She looked magnificent, Marguerite thought, getting ready to wave. It was the decade of velvet and plush, and her immense crinoline supported a gown of plum-colored velvet crossed with bands of delphinium blue. Her short cloak was of the same material, tied with bows of blue velvet ribbon, and her velvet bonnet was trimmed with the latest thing in veils: a little blue curtain that could be drawn across the face in bashful moments by the pulling of a cord. Not that Marianne pulled the cord when she was bashful, because she never was, but she pulled it when she was annoyed. She must be annoyed now, Marguerite thought, for the blue folds entirely hid her face, and she took no notice of her sister’s greeting. She spoke no word to Pierre, and she entered the house with swift, tapping heels and banged the door. Someone must have opposed her wishes at the meeting, thought Marguerite, and she went back to her mending a little depressed, for it would be a hard evening to get through with Marianne in one of her difficult moods. If only people knew what she’s like at home, thought Marguerite, after they’ve disagreed with her, they’d never, never do it. They wouldn’t have the heart.
2
Marianne closed her bedroom door with a sigh of relief. She would have a good half hour of quiet before it was time to dress for dinner. She would be able to lie down and rest her head, that always ached if she was argued with, as she had been argued with today by those tiresome women at the meeting who had dared to disagree with her upon the subject of Adult Education for the Lower Orders, a subject upon which she was the only woman of good family on the Island entitled to express an opinion, the rest of the females present either having no education worth speaking of, or being incapable of handing it on to the Lower Orders if they had it.
“Oh, my!” said Old Nick, Dr. Ozanne’s parrot whom she hated but kept always standing on a table in her room for love of him and William. “Oh, my! Take a rhubarb pill, dearie, and splice the mainyard. Oh, my! Oh, my!”
She removed her cloak and bonnet, her gown, her three petticoats and her crinoline, loosened the agonizing tightness of her corsets, wrapped herself in a green silk wrapper and lay down upon her bed.
From where she lay she could see the sea and the harbor, and hear the spring voices of wind and rain and bird song sounding about the house. There was a rainbow arched over the sea beyond the harbor, and in its perfect half circle there appeared, seen dimly through the veil of a shower, the phantom of a white-sailed ship. Tears gathered and made stiff tracks from the corners of her eyes to her ears before they trickled to the pillow. She rubbed them away angrily with her handkerchief, for weeping was always unbecoming to her, and she indulged in no weakness that would cause her fading charms to recede even quicker than they were doing anyhow. It was absurd to be forever stabbed by the sight of a sailing ship. Both William and the Green Dolphin had sailed out of her life so long ago that it was useless to think of them any more. Perhaps it was really rather silly of her to have chosen this room that looked out upon the sea. She picked up her cut glass scent bottle, breathed in its scent of frangipani, and resolutely closed her eyes.
She was disturbed by Marguerite.
“The packet is in!” cried Marguerite. “I saw it from the passage window. Marianne, the packet is in!”
“What of it?” asked Marianne dampingly, without opening her eyes.
Marguerite, standing in the window, laughed and refused to be damped. “The packet coming in always excites me,” she said. “One never knows what it will bring.”
“What could it bring?” asked Marianne.
“Once it brought William and his father,” said Marguer
ite.
Marianne sat up suddenly. “How dare you!” she whispered, trembling with almost hysterical anger. “How dare you! You ought to know that I cannot bear to speak of them. All the understanding and love I ever had they gave me. When they went out of my life there was nothing left . . . except the poor . . . except the poor.”
Marguerite came to the foot of the fourposter and stood looking down at her sister with love and compunction. Unerring though she was in most of her human contacts, she was somehow always a blundering idiot with Marianne.
“Why must you come bursting into my room without even knocking?” demanded Marianne. “You behave like a schoolgirl still. An undisciplined, impetuous schoolgirl. It’s ridiculous at your age.”
Marguerite laughed, quite unruffled by the tirade. It was one of the most exasperating things about her, Marianne thought, that she seemed nowadays impervious to annoyance. If she had canceled out temper with temper sometimes, as she had done in her girlhood, they would have got on better, for it is very hard not to dislike those who are the cause of the accusing of one’s conscience. And yet she never quite ceased to love Marguerite. She was her little sister, and they had both of them lost William.
“I came to see if your head was bad and if you’d like to go to bed before dinner,” said Marguerite.
“My head’s splitting,” snapped Marianne. “But what would be the good of going to bed? I shall get up. Give me a dose of camphor julep and find me my magenta tarlatan.”
She took the restorative and lay back on her pillows, watching her sister. Marguerite had already changed her gown, and her crinoline was covered by a frothing mass of primrose-colored flounces that set off her fair beauty to perfection. She had a little bunch of the first primroses, her favorite flower, pinned into the front of it. She was very lovely still. “Because she feels nothing,” thought Marianne. “She is colder than any ice.”