The Great Taboo Part 5

You'll always stop with me!"

The girl's surprise showed more profoundly than ever. "Me can't go away," she answered, with emphasis. "Me your Shadow. That great Taboo.

Tu-Kila-Kila great G.o.d. If me go away, Tu-Kila-Kila kill me and eat me."

Muriel started back in horror. "But, Mali," she said, looking hard at the girl's pleasant brown face, "if you were three years in Australia, you're a Christian, surely!"

The girl nodded her head in pa.s.sive acquiescence. "Me Christian in Australia," she answered. "Of course me Christian. All folks make Christian when him go to Queensland. That what for me call Mali, and my sister Jani. We have other names on my own island; but when we go to Queensland, gentleman baptize us, call us Mali and Jani. Me Methodist in Queensland. Methodist very good. But Methodist G.o.d no live in Boupari.

Not any good be Methodist here any longer. Tu-Kila-Kila G.o.d here. Him very powerful."

"What! Not that dreadful creature that they took us to see this morning!"

Muriel exclaimed, in horror. "Oh, Mali, you can't mean to say they think he's a _G.o.d_, that awful man there!"

Mali nodded her a.s.sent with profound conviction. "Yes, yes; him G.o.d," she repeated, confidently. "Him very powerful. My sister Jani go too near him temple, against taboo--because her not belong-a Tu-Kila-Kila temple; and last night, when it great feast, plenty men catch Jani, and tie him up in rope; and Tu-Kila-Kila kill him, and plenty Boupari men help Tu-Kila-Kila eat up Jani."

She said it in the same simple, matter-of-fact way as she had said that she was a nurse for three years in Queensland. To her it was a common incident of everyday life. Such accidents _will_ happen, if you break taboo and go too near forbidden temples.

But Muriel drew back, and let the pleasant-looking brown girl's hand drop suddenly. "You can't mean it," she cried. "You can't mean he's a G.o.d!

Such a wicked man as that! Oh, his very look's too horrible."

Mali drew back in her turn with a somewhat terrified air, and peeped suspiciously around her, as if to make sure whether any one was listening. "Oh, hush," she said, anxiously. "Don't must talk like that.

If Tu-Kila-Kila hear, him scorch us up to ashes. Him very great G.o.d!

Him good! Him powerful!"

"How can he be good if he does such awful things?" Muriel exclaimed, energetically.

Mali peered around her once more with terrified eyes in the same uneasy way. "Take care," she said again. "Him G.o.d! Him powerful! Him can do no wrong. Him King of the Trees! Him King of Heaven! On Boupari island, Methodist G.o.d not much; no G.o.d so great like Tu-Kila-Kila."

"But a _man_ can't be a G.o.d!" Muriel exclaimed, contemptuously. "He's nothing but a man! a savage! A cannibal!"

Mali looked back at her in wondering surprise. "Not in Queensland," she answered, calmly--to her, all the world naturally divided itself into Queensland and Polynesia--"no G.o.d in Queensland. Governor, him very great chief; but him no G.o.d like Tu-Kila-Kila. Methodist G.o.d in sky, him only G.o.d that live in Queensland. But no use worship Methodist G.o.d over here in Boupari. Him no live here. Tu-Kila-Kila live here. All G.o.d here make out of man. Live in man. Korong! What for you say a man can't be a G.o.d!

You G.o.d yourself! White gentleman there, G.o.d! Korong, Korong. Chief put you in Heaven, so make you a G.o.d. People pray to you now. People bring you presents."

"You don't mean to say," Muriel cried, "they bring me these things because they think me a G.o.ddess?"

Mali nodded a grave a.s.sent. "Same like people give money in church in Queensland," she answered, promptly. "Ask you make rain, make plenty crop, make bread-fruit grow, make banana, make plantain. You Korong now.

While your time last, Queenie, people give you plenty of present."

"While my time last?" Muriel repeated, with a curious sense of discomfort creeping over her slowly.

The girl nodded an easy a.s.sent. "Yes, while your time last," she answered, laying a small bundle of palm-leaves at Muriel's back by way of a cushion. "For now you Korong. By and by, Korong pa.s.s to somebody else.

This year, you Korong. So people worship you."

But nothing that Muriel could say would induce the girl further to explain her meaning. She shook her head and looked very wise. "When a G.o.d come into somebody," she said, nodding toward Muriel in a mysterious way, "then him G.o.d himself; him Korong. When the G.o.d go away from him, him Korong no longer; somebody else Korong. Queenie Korong now; so people worship him. While him time last, people plenty kind to him."

The day pa.s.sed away, and night came on. As it approached, heavy clouds drifted up from eastward. Mali busied herself with laying out a rough bed in the hut for Muriel, and making her a pillow of soft moss and the curious lichen-like material that hangs parasitic from the trees, and is commonly known as "old man's beard." As both Mali and Felix a.s.sured her confidently no harm would come to her within so strict a Taboo, Muriel, worn out with fatigue and terror, lay down at last and slept soundly on this native subst.i.tute for a bedstead. She slept without dreaming, while Mali lay at her feet, ready at a moment's call. It was all so strange; and yet she was too utterly wearied to do otherwise than sleep, in spite of her strange and terrible surroundings.

Felix slept, too, for some hours, but woke with a start in the night. It was raining heavily. He could hear the loud patter of a fierce tropical shower on the roof of his hut. His Shadow, at his feet, slept still unmoved; but when Felix rose on his elbow, the Shadow rose on a sudden, too, and confronted him curiously. The young man heard the rain; then he bowed down his face with an awed air, not visible, but audible, in the still darkness. "It has come!" he said, with superst.i.tious terror. "It has come at last! my lord has brought it!"

After that, Felix lay awake for some hours, hearing the rain on the roof, and puzzled in his own head by a half-uncertain memory. What was it in his school reading that that ceremony with the water indefinitely reminded him of? Wasn't there some Greek or Roman superst.i.tion about shaking your head when water was poured upon it? What could that superst.i.tion be, and what light might it cast on that mysterious ceremony? He wished he could remember; but it was so long since he'd read it, and he never cared much at school for Greek or Roman antiquities.

Suddenly, in a lull of the rain, the whole context at once came back with a rush to him. He remembered now he had read it, some time or other, in some cla.s.sical dictionary. It was a custom connected with Greek sacrifices. The officiating priest poured water or wine on the head of the sheep, bullock, or other victim. If the victim shook its head and knocked off the drops, that was a sign that it was fit for the sacrifice, and that the G.o.d accepted it. If the victim trembled visibly, that was a most favorable omen. If it stood quite still and didn't move its neck, then the G.o.d rejected it as unfit for his purpose. Couldn't _that_ be the meaning of the ceremony performed on Muriel and himself in "Heaven" that morning? Were they merely intended as human sacrifices? Were they to be kept meanwhile and, as it were, fed up for the slaughter? It was too horrible to believe; yet it almost looked like it.

He wished he knew the meaning of that strange word, "Korong." Clearly, it contained the true key to the mystery.

Anyhow, he had always his trusty knife. If the worst came to the worst--those wretches should never harm his spotless Muriel.

For he loved her to-night; he would watch over and protect her. He would save her at least from the deadliest of insults.

CHAPTER VII.

INTERCHANGE OF CIVILITIES.

All night long, without intermission, the heavy tropical rain descended in torrents; at sunrise it ceased, and a bright blue vault of sky stood in a spotless dome over the island of Boupari.

As soon as the sun was well risen, and the rain had ceased, one shy native girl after another came straggling up timidly to the white line that marked the taboo round Felix and Muriel's huts. They came with more baskets of fruit and eggs. Humbly saluting three times as they drew near, they laid down their gifts modestly just outside the line, with many loud e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.ns of praise and grat.i.tude to the G.o.ds in their own language.

"What do they say?" Muriel asked, in a dazed and frightened way, looking out of the hut door, and turning in wonder to Mali.

"They say, 'Thank you, Queenie, for rain and fruits,'" Mali answered, unconcerned, bustling about in the hut. "Missy want to wash him face and hands this morning? Lady always wash every day over yonder in Queensland."

Muriel nodded a.s.sent. It was all so strange to her. But Mali went to the door and beckoned carelessly to one of the native girls just outside, who drew near the line at the summons, with a somewhat frightened air, putting one finger to her mouth in coyly uncertain savage fashion.

"Fetch me water from the spring!" Mali said, authoritatively, in Polynesian. Without a moment's delay the girl darted off at the top of her speed, and soon returned with a large calabash full of fresh cool water, which she lay down respectfully by the taboo line, not daring to cross it.

"Why didn't you get it yourself?" Muriel asked of her Shadow, rather relieved than otherwise that Mali hadn't left her. It was something in these dire straits to have somebody always near who could at least speak a little English.

Mali started back in surprise. "Oh, that would never do," she answered, catching a colloquial phrase she had often heard long before in Queensland. "Me missy's Shadow. That great Taboo. If me go away out of missy's sight, very big sin--very big danger. Man-a-Boupari catch me and kill me like Jani, for no me stop and wait all the time on missy."

It was clear that human life was held very cheap on the island of Boupari.

Muriel made her scanty toilet in the hut as well as she was able, with the calabash and water, aided by a rough sh.e.l.l comb which Mali had provided for her. Then she breakfasted, not ill, off eggs and fruit, which Mali cooked with some rude native skill over the open-air fire without in the precincts.

After breakfast, Felix came in to inquire how she had pa.s.sed the night in her new quarters. Already Muriel felt how odd was the contrast between the quiet politeness of his manner as an English gentleman and the strange savage surroundings in which they both now found themselves.

Civilization is an attribute of communities; we necessarily leave it behind when we find ourselves isolated among barbarians or savages. But culture is a purely personal and individual possession; we carry it with us wherever we go; and no circ.u.mstances of life can ever deprive us of it.

As they sat there talking, with a deep and abiding sense of awe at the change (Muriel more conscious than ever now of how deep was her interest in Felix Thurstan, who represented for her all that was dearest and best in England), a curious noise, as of a discordant drum or tom-tom, beaten in a sort of recurrent tune, was heard toward the hills; and at its very first sound both the Shadows, flinging themselves upon their faces with every sign of terror, endeavored to hide themselves under the native mats with which the bare little hut was roughly carpeted.

"What's the matter?" Felix cried, in English, to Mali; for Muriel had already explained to him how the girl had picked up some knowledge of our tongue in Queensland.

Mali trembled in every limb, so that she could hardly speak.

"Tu-Kila-Kila come," she answered, all breathless. "No blackfellow look at him. Burn blackfellow up. You and Missy Korong. All right for you. Go out to meet him!"

"Tu-Kila-Kila is coming," the young man-Shadow said, in Polynesian, almost in the same breath, and no less tremulously. "We dare not look upon his face lest he burn us to ashes. He is a very great Taboo. His face is fire. But you two are G.o.ds. Step forth to receive him."

Felix took Muriel's hand in his, somewhat trembling himself, and led her forth on to the open s.p.a.ce in front of the huts to meet the man-G.o.d. She followed him like a child. She was woman enough for that. She had implicit trust in him.