“You flatter me,” answered Lueli in a pleased voice.
Then he sighed. “I wish you were not going,” he said. “I shall miss you. I shall miss you terribly. Oh, why must you leave me?” And he hung his head and kicked his heels disconsolately.
The water splashed up, drops of spray fell on Mr. Fortune. He shivered, but it was not the falling spray which chilled him. What could he say, how was he to comfort this child?
“Do you remember how I used to tell you about my God?”
“Yes, of course I remember.”
“I haven’t spoken of Him lately, and perhaps you have noticed that.”
“Yes.”
“Well, the reason why I didn’t speak of Him was—I have lost Him. I lost Him on the same night that you lost yours, the night of the earthquake. No!”—Lueli had made a sudden movement of inquiry. “He wasn’t anything in the hut, He wasn’t any of the things that were burnt. He wasn’t the kind of God that could be burnt. But He was the kind of God that could perfectly well be lost; and, as I say, I have lost Him.”
“But perhaps you will find Him, perhaps He will come back. I—my god——”
Lueli’s voice sank into a warm cautious silence, the silence of a lover.
Mr. Fortune put out a hand and stroked the wet head.
“No. I am quite sure I shall never find Him. But I have no doubt He is somewhere around, and that is why I am telling you of my loss. Because, you see, when I go I shall leave Him behind; my God will remain here on the island where I lost Him. And while He remains, a part of me will remain too. I do not leave you utterly.”
“Like a keepsake?” ventured Lueli after thinking it over.
“Yes. Like a keepsake. But rather more than a keepsake. Almost like leaving part of myself.”
“Yes. I think I understand.”
“So now do you feel happier?”
“Not now. But I shall later on.”
It had not been anywhere near as bad as he had dreaded that it would be. It had even been a rather comfortable conversation, and one that he would be able to look back upon with kindness.
The next day, the last day, was spent in packing and leave-taking. The news of his approaching departure was received with genuine regret, and from every one he met with such kind concern that it would have been impossible not to feel gratified even if he had wished to be above that sort of feeling. Ori, Teioa, and the other important islanders got up a farewell feast in his honour. Speeches were made, his health was drunk, and afterwards Mr. Fortune sat on the best mats, flushed with praise and wearing as many garlands as a May Queen or a coffin, while presentations were made to him. A necklace of carved sharks’-teeth, bracelets of scented nuts, mother-of-pearl earrings, several pipes, spears, paddles, and carved walking-sticks, rolls of tapa and fine mats, coloured baskets, polished bowls, sweetmeats and cosmetics, several remembrance-knots of curiously plaited hair, and charms of all sorts—these were piled up on his lap and all around him. Only Lueli brought no gift. He sat beside him, examining and praising the gifts of the others and pointing out their beauties.
“I do hope he isn’t feeling out of it because he has brought no present,” thought Mr. Fortune. “My blessed child, he is too generous to have anything left to give. But I can’t bear to think that he might be put out of countenance. I could almost wish——”
At that moment he became aware that Lueli was no longer by his side. The conversation suddenly died down, there was a conscious, premonitory pause and people were looking towards the door of the house. They wriggled to either side, opening a sort of lane. And then Lueli stepped over the threshold, carrying a resplendent head-dress of straw-coloured and scarlet feathers.
Walking solemnly, with a rapt and formal face, he advanced down the lane, bearing on high the softly-waving and coloured crown, till with a deep bow he laid the head-dress at Mr. Fortune’s feet.
“But, Lueli!” exclaimed Mr. Fortune, too much overcome for words of thanks. “This lovely thing, this marvellous thing! Is it—can it be——?”
“Lueli is your especial friend,” said Ori. “It is right that he should make you the best gift.”
There was a loud hum of approval. Mr. Fortune raised the head-dress, admired it all round, and put it on. The hum of approval swelled into acclamations and loud cheers.
Then it was Mr. Fortune’s turn to produce gifts. He had spent most of the forenoon going over his possessions, such as they were, and in between spells of working on the idol he had contrived to make an assortment of pipe-stoppers, tooth-picks, bodkins, and such-like small items. With these and the mother-of-pearl counters and almost all his buttons he was enabled to produce a tolerable array; and though he apologised a great deal over their inadequacy there was no need to apologise, for the recipients were overjoyed with objects so distinguished and far-fetched.
The knife, at once his most personal and valuable possession, was naturally for Lueli, and so was his pipe. Ori received the magnifying-glass and his two sons the whistle and the flint-and-steel lighter respectively. To Teioa he presented the magnet and to Mrs. Teioa the medicine spoon. Lueli’s mother went into fits of rapture over the measuring-tape; Tekea, a handsome, rather taciturn fellow, who had helped a great deal with the new hut, was much gratified by the nail-file; the Parnell medal was hung round Fuma’s neck and the pencil-case round Vaili’s. The pencil-sharpener he gave to Lei-lei, village sorceress, doctoress, and midwife, who declared that it would be an invaluable asset. At the last moment he remembered Hina, the old story-teller. He gave her the wash-leather bag.
After songs and dances the party broke up at a late hour; and still wearing his crown Mr. Fortune walked home with Lueli by moonlight. The other gifts he had left behind, for Ori had undertaken to see that they were packed properly, ready for the morrow. A night bird was calling among the trees—a soft breathy note like an alto flute—and the roof of the hut shone in the moonlight.
“Will you go on living here, Lueli?”
“Of course. Where else should I like to live so well?”
“I am glad. I shall know how to picture you when I am thinking of you.”
“When I think of you I shall not know where you are.”
“Think of me here.”
As a result of the party they overslept themselves, and they were still breakfasting when Tekea came running up to say that the launch had been sighted. Mr. Fortune became a man of action. He knew instantly that no one from St. Fabien could be allowed to set foot on his island. He gave instructions to Tekea accordingly: a canoe might go out to the reef to keep them in play, but no one was to be taken off the launch on any account.
“What shall I tell them,” asked Tekea, “if they want to land?”
“Tell them——” What could they be told? Small-pox, tigers, taboos, hornets in swarm; he ran over a few pretexts but nothing seemed quite suitable. “Tell them,” he said, “tell them I say so. By the way, you might take them out a few bananas.”
Tekea grinned. He was an understanding fellow. He ran back to the village while Mr. Fortune and Lueli followed at a more leisurely pace. There was nothing to delay them: Mr. Fortune was already dressed in his European clothes, and the feather head-dress was carefully packed in a large leafy frail. Just as they were crossing the dell he stopped. “Wait a minute,” he said, “we never washed up the breakfast things.”
“I can do that afterwards.”
“No indeed! That would be dismal. We will do it now, and shake out the mats. There is plenty of time, and if there isn’t it won’t hurt them to wait. They’ll have the bananas to amuse them.”
Together they put all straight and tidy, folded up Mr. Fortune’s island clothes, threw away the garlands of overnight and the unused twigs and vines that had been plucked for the packing of the head-dress, and removed every trace of departure. Then they set forth for the village once more.
Every one was out to see Mr. Fortune off and wish him good luck. The launch was outside the reef and his luggage
was being conveyed on board. There was a vast amount of it, and it seemed even more numerous because of the quantity of helping hands outstretched to deal with it. It was all so exactly like what he had foreseen that he felt as though he were in a dream—the beach, the lagoon, thronged with excited well-wishers, canoes getting their outriggers entangled and nearly upsetting, hands thrust out of the water to right them, every one laughing and exclaiming. Every one, that is, except Lueli: Mr. Fortune had not been able to include him in his foreseeing of the last act. He had been lively and natural at breakfast; but now he was silent, he was pale, he was being brave. “If I say something cheerful,” thought Mr. Fortune, “I may upset him. What shall I say?” At the water’s edge he turned to him. “Forgive me if——” He got no further for Lueli’s arms were flung about his neck. Mr. Fortune gently patted him on the back.
He got into the canoe and the dream began again. The canoe manœuvred at the opening of the reef, it dodged forward between the waves. He stood up, he felt the sea sidle and thrust under him as the earth had done on the night of the earthquake, the rope was thrown, he touched the side of the launch, he was on board.
In the launch was the secretary, grown bald and corpulent, who immediately began to tell Mr. Fortune about the Great War, saying that the Germans crucified Belgian children, were a disgrace to humanity, and should be treated after the same fashion themselves.
Mr. Fortune sat listening and saying at intervals: “Indeed!” and: “How terrible!” and: “Of course I have heard nothing of all this.” His eyes were fixed upon the coral reef where Lueli stood, poised above the surf, and waving a green frond in farewell. As the launch gathered speed Lueli’s figure grew smaller and smaller; at last he was lost to sight, and soon the island of Fanua appeared to be sinking back into the sea whence it had arisen.
Now the secretary was abusing the French; and from them he passed to the Turks, the Italians, and King Ferdinand of Bulgaria. Mr. Fortune could not yet gather who was fighting who, still less what they were all fighting about. However, there seemed no doubt but that it was a very comprehensive dog-fight.
“Shall I go back to Europe?” he thought. “I couldn’t fight, but perhaps I might pick up the wounded. No! I am too old to be of any use; and besides, I have no money to pay my passage.”
The launch scurried on with a motion that might have been described as rollicking if it had not also been so purposeful and business-like. The paint which used to be white picked out with dark blue was now buff picked out with chocolate. The mechanic was a new one. He had stared at Mr. Fortune when the latter came aboard, and now he came out of the engine-house with a rag in his hand and began polishing the brass-work, turning round at frequent intervals to have another look at him.
“Perhaps he expected me to carry a goatskin umbrella,” thought Mr. Fortune.
The secretary displayed no such interest. He asked no questions about Fanua, a negligible peaceful spot, not like Europe, not to be compared to St. Fabien, where there was a gunboat and a fermenting depot for the Red Cross Fund. And as for Mr. Fortune, he had known years ago all that there was to know about him, and that wasn’t much.
His conversation shifted from the wife of an ex–prime minister who was certainly in the pay of the Germans to the proprietor of the Pension Hibiscus who had attempted to charge for teas served to the ladies of the Swab Committee and was probably a spy. Meanwhile the island of Fanua was sinking deeper into the Pacific Ocean.
At last he stopped talking. Mr. Fortune knew that he ought now to say something, but he felt incapable of comment. He did not seem to have an idea left. Everything that was real, everything that was significant, had gone down with the island of Fanua and was lost for ever.
No. After all there was one thing he might ask, one small interest which had been overlooked in the pillaging of his existence.
“By the by, can you tell me the exact time?”
He was an hour and twenty minutes out. A bad guess on his part. But perhaps it was not quite such bad guessing as it now appeared to be; for he had spent three and a half years in Fanua, and his watch might well have lost half an hour or so in that time. It was a good watch once; but Time will wear out even watches, and it had seen its best days.
ENVOY
My poor Timothy, good-bye! I do not know what will become of you.
THE SALUTATION
THE SUN was voyaging towards the horizon. The poplars unrolled their shadows towards the well; before long the water’s unblinking reflection of the sky would be meshed over by the footfalls of the breeze, and a leaf or two, already done with summer, would waver down. But it was still the hour of the siesta, for a while yet nothing would move but the sun and the shadows. All round the house, for miles and miles and miles, though there was no ear to hear it, a continuous small sound existed—the crackle of the ripened sunflower seeds breaking from their envelopes. On all sides the land travelled smoothly to the sky-line. To the eastward it was a pale silvery gold, to the westward, dun. The vegetation was so close and even that it had the appearance of turf—only where the road ran did the eye relinquish the hallucination, realising the height of the summer growth. Moving slowly through that growth the backs of the cattle appeared as porpoises lolling on the ocean surface.
The House of the Salutation was old. It was long, low and rambling, with differing roof levels. Only in the centre block had it an upper story. It was colour-washed in various tints of ochre and lemon, and its deep-set windows were guarded with wrought-iron jalousies, so rusty and brittle that a good blow would have shattered them like withies. The farm buildings were more recent. They were built of brick and corrugated iron, expensively. Two wind-fans for pumping water stood near by. When the breeze came they would begin to clank, gently, and that would be the signal for waking.
But now everything slept. The yellow bitch lay poured out in the shade. She had whelped recently, and she lay on her side to ease her swollen teats. Her pups slept in a confused rumple of soft fur beside her: five straight tails stuck out from the mass—puppy-dogs’ tails, broad at the base, diamonded to a point. The sappy pumpkin leaves wilted under the sun’s rays, sprawling flaccidly over the fruit. A snake lay asleep on a stone, relaxed, its life narrowed into the pin-points of its eyes, and a bucket lay on its side, sleeping too.
The fowls had scratched themselves dust baths, and basked in their usual place, round the arbour. It had been put up long ago, in the taste of mid–nineteenth century Europe, sentimentally eclectic, and from the interior of its rather Swiss roof topped with a spiral there dangled an empty bird-cage. Round it were beds of balsam and portulaca, and it was here, in the soft earth, that the fowls scratched themselves in. When the pumping fans began to clank, Quita would come out and shoo them away; and on the morrow they would sleep there again. Everything slept, the slow indefinite contours of the pampas seemed to heave and fall towards the horizon, heave and fall with the rhythmical tide of slumber. Even the vultures, slowly wheeling overhead, seemed to sleep on that blue.
After she had scolded the fowls Quita would bring her mistress a cup of chocolate; for if one is a good sleeper one awakes hungry, and Angustias had always been a good sleeper. She practised sleep, indeed, with such mastery that she had a repertory of different slumbers which she could command at will, slumbers ranging from the slight gauze of inattention suitable for sermons and too prolonged explanations to the quilted oblivion fit for a winter’s night. The siesta sleep was poised about midway between these extremes; it was, perhaps, more akin to the former.
In this sleep one composed one’s thoughts—at night, dismissed—almost consciously watching them take on the greater composure and deliberation of dreams. For the sleep of night one abandoned the waking self; in the siesta one but renounced it, laid it a little aside, on the bed-table, maybe, with the handkerchief and the fan, ready to be taken up again when Quita came with the chocolate. In other words, at night one slept as an animal, but during the siesta as a lady.
Thus it wa
s that she heard the first cough.
Undoubtedly an Englishman. No other nation coughed like that—so dryly, and with such reserve. Just so had her husband coughed, and his friends also. Sometimes, shortly after coughing, they would speak. And as they coughed, so they spoke: dryly, and with reserve. A curious race, rarely, if ever, unlocking their voices, save to a horse or a dog. Something should have been done about those puppies. But now it was too late. They would grow up undocked and chase the hens. It was a pity that none of them showed any resemblance to their great-great-grandmother, Harry’s pointer. Once, long ago, in historical times, the Kings of Spain had kept pointers, so Harry had said. That was in the summer when she had first worn straight-fronted corsets, and a hat trimmed with white lilac and green bows. The Señora Pacheco kept such an insane quantity of cats, it was rumoured that one had actually been found by a visitor, curled up in the spare-room chamber-pot.
Cough.
How strange an affair was the mind! She had not heard an English cough for twenty years, not since Mr. Gauntlett had come on business, after Harry’s death; yet she had never forgotten the sound, it was as unmistakable as the rattle of the chocolate-cups which she heard daily. One might have sworn, so clearly had the mind conjured it up, that it came from a real Englishman. If Johnny had lived the house might still be ringing with English coughs, for he was to be sent to school in England, she had agreed to that, and they were all to go over together, and drive through Hyde Park in London. Mother of God, life was not too easy! During the first year of her widowhood there had been three proposals of marriage, not a moment to oneself; and now she was left with a son-in-law, who wrote constantly, and enclosed Government pamphlets on stock-breeding.
The thought of the pamphlets almost woke her. She turned a little, re-dedicating herself to sleep; and in that moment she heard the cough for the third time.
But it was real! What was happening now?
She sat up and rang the little silver bell that stood beside the fan and the handkerchief. Then she listened again. There was no sound—could she after all have been mistaken? No! At the age of sixty one is not deceived by fancies, like a girl. How that old hag Quita slept! it was intolerable that any one of God’s creatures should sleep so besottedly. She rang the bell more vigorously, and was still ringing it when Quita entered the room.
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