“You stopper at Papeete?” said he, as we finished our drink and came out of the café.
“Yes,” I replied; and this answer of mine seemed to give him immense satisfaction.
I saw Pokara almost daily after that, and I vow that it was chiefly his wondrous personality and its effect on my youthful mind that made me leave the Presidency orchestra and take to troubadouring with the old Tahitian chief.
“You comer with me and play violin in villages a longer way off, and we make lots of money,” said he one day, after I had been down at his primitive homestead. Then he began to tell me Arabian Nights tales concerning the riches of the native villages and the wonders to be seen in the pagan citadels over the mountains. And so it happened that we went off together. It was a glorious day when I found myself tramping with my violin strung beside me, crossing the palm-clad slopes of Mount Orehena, en route for the pagan villages where dwelt great high-caste chiefs and chiefesses.
It seemed like some wild dream of a mediæval age when I first stood in a pagan township playing my violin to dark-eyed, dusky houris. They stood with finger to their hushed lips as I played by their bamboo huts and Pokara sang a weird himine. I might say here that Pokara had made me memorize several quaint heathen tunes before we started off on that expedition, as well as telling me monstrous tales about princes and chiefs who would cast pearls at my feet as prolifically as one throws rice on a happy marriage morn. But, alas! it was not all as rosy as my Tahitian comrade had painted it. And I thanked Heaven that the expenses attached to the rôle of troubadouring were not over-abundant in those glorious climes. Beyond languishing glances from the star-eyed, golden-skinned Tahitian belles, I did not get much out of the adventure; but I must admit that the sight of Pokara, with his tasselled sash flung gracefully over his tawny shoulder and a fascinating poetic grin on his wrinkled mouth, was something worth sweating across those tropic miles for in far-off Tahiti. I know that Pokara seemed to look upon that trip as the time of his life, as he passed round amongst our dusky audiences with his coco-nut-shell collecting-box. Often the old chiefs would persuade us to stay the night in the village, so that we might serenade them at their sacred festival rites and wedding ceremonies. And for such services we would receive the highest honours and valuable curios—tappa-cloth, pearl shells, and many things that would make a heavy load. Pokara managed to get hold of two large sacks, and, filling them with our presents, had the cheek to ask me to carry one. But this I positively refused to do, whereupon Pokara hid his booty in the jungle till such time as he could come back and fetch it.
I think we had been on this South Sea buskin march for about three weeks when we arrived at a pagan citadel where we had quite an exciting adventure,—though, in good truth, we had many adventures that may not be recorded here. One night, after we had been tramping miles through breadfruit forests and by the rugged feet of lines of mountains, we came to a pagan citadel called Ta-e-mao. I shall never forget the surprise of the dusky inhabitants as we emerged from beneath the palms and I began to play an old Tahitian madrigal, while Pokara wailed out words that I did not understand. I was attired in duck pants and a brass-bound midshipman’s reefer jacket, and had on my head a large, dilapidated helmet hat. As for Pokara, though he was travel-stained and perspiration had washed much of the gold pigment from his ambrosial locks, he was a sight fitted to awaken admiration in all hearts. After the inhabitants had rushed from their huts and got over the first surprise of our sudden appearance, they were overcome with joy as I played on and Pokara sang.
I don’t exactly know what happened that night in Ta-e-mao, though I do know that the high chiefs and chiefesses treated us both with that punctilious etiquette always accorded troubadours in those South Sea mediæval ages. It appeared that we had arrived on the occasion of a great festival that was being given in honour of the visit of an aged king from one of the islands to the south. He was a remarkable-looking old fellow. He had a face like a gnarled tree-trunk carved to resemble a man. His teeth were white as snow. He wore side-whiskers and had a large seashell tied on to them. He was so stout that, when he went to drink out of the festival calabash, the royal attendants laid the receptacle down on the top of his corporation, then bowed and withdrew. He had brought with him his two daughters, or granddaughters, I forget which. They were comely-looking girls. One was even beautiful, according to our European ideas of that oft-misused word. Her thick, curly hair was artistically adorned with orange blossoms, and her attire consisted of a most attractively woven raiment of tappa-cloth that fell to her knees. She had fine dark eyes, luminous with a golden light, and they might well have fired the imagination of a less bold and outrageous youth than myself. Though I was not aware of it, Pokara well knew that she was taboo-bride, which means that she had just arrived of age, and, being a princess of a certain grand old dynasty, was entitled to propose to, and accept, the first high chief of royal blood, or whoever might please her eyes. In short, my confession is this: I made gallant advances to her, and she received them with an abandonment that was boundlessly refreshing and romantic, not only to myself but to the royal assemblage of high chiefs and the old king also. One thing will I say in palliation of all that I may have done, and that is, that I had not the slightest idea that the delicious cooling drink proffered to Pokara and myself with immense liberality was an intoxicating beverage. And I am sure that that drink had a good deal to do with the heathenish doings of Pokara and myself and the final episode that night in Ta-e-mao. Her name was Soovalao, and it is a positive fact that Soovalao stood before me, lifted one dusky arm, and sang a heathen bridal himine to my eyes! The applause at this choice of hers was terrific! It is even possible that I, in some subconscious way, responded to the princess’s love-tokens and modest caresses. For I distinctly recall that I heard the tribal drums crash forth a mighty fortissimo con passione as I gallantly accepted the beautifully-carved tortoise-shell comb from her hair, kissed her hand, and repeated some old Tahitian rite! But alas! in delicate compassion for those who would resent this sad confession, I will draw a veil of forgetfulness over the final heathen dance, when I played the fiddle and Pokara sang, and it seemed that a thousand dusky beauties of a phantom forest seraglio somersaulted beneath the moonlit palms!
At daybreak I awoke. Pokara was stirring beside me.
“Hush, O Papalagi, ’tis well that we fly at once.”
“Fly where?” I said, as I rubbed my eyes and stared.