At this my Cockney friend gave his inimitable side wink, expectorated on to my boot and remarked:
“Seen ’im darn Mile End way; a damned ole Indian ’awker, hout ’ere in the Sarth Seas aselling doar-mats and getting raund gals—that’s wat ’e ’is!”
We saw this sight: Abduh Allah with one knee bent Islamic wise as he dangled before Waylao’s eyes a fascinating brass leg-bangle. It was a sight replete with Biblical import, resembling nothing so much as a modernised South Sea version of the devil’s first love affair in the Garden of Eden.
From all that I perceived I was convinced that the magic carpet with all its possibilities wasn’t in it with that little Islamic carpet bag. It could overthrow creeds and heathen deities; it brought thousands of dusky maids to the feet of that old fraud, the harem-keeper of Mecca—Mohammed. It was even hinted that the devil himself sighed amongst the forest mangroves, when the heathen maids crowded by the hut doors and the stealthy old Indian opened that little carpet bag. I managed to see Waylao alone, and begged the favour of escorting her home. I well knew, from her own confession, that she must not be too late. Old Takaroa, the great high chief, who had ceased to pound the big drum, and was telling me in vehement pidgin-English mighty incidents of his high lineage, tried to detain me longer in vain. My wish to accompany the half-caste girl was greater than my affection for that Marquesan chief and his kind. I admit I was deeply interested in those old chiefs. And some day, when the seas are safe from submarines and high explosives, when the war fever has subsided from the martial bosoms of the Western world’s high chiefs, I’ll cast my disembowelling instruments and guns on to the rubbish heaps and sail away down South once more.
I have basked in the spiritual light of the abstruse pages of Herachlitus, Empedocles, Plato, Socrates, Plotinus, Olympiodorus, Proclus, Synesius, down to Spinoza and Kant of the latest Old Gang, with the result that I am determined to live my life amongst uncivilised peoples, peaceful semi-heathen people of the Solomon Isles. How happy will I be! I’ve still a life before me—the consequence of beginning young.
O happy days! I recall the tumbling, moonlit, silvered seas breaking silently afar as I strolled by the side of that half-caste girl. We had left the barbarian festival behind. When we arrived at her bungalow her mother welcomed me with a smile, but with the impulsiveness of her tribe swore at Waylao with much vigour.
“Wheres you been? You lazy tafoa vale [beachcomber], I told you come ’omes soons.”
“Kaoah! Whaine! Aue!” wailed the maid, soothing the maternal wrath with swift Marquesan phrases that I could not understand.
The maternal ire vanished completely as Waylao hung her head with shame, and the old mother shrieked: “Père de N—— the good missions mans been ’ere. ’E want know whys you no be in mission-room these many days.” Saying this, the old native woman took a deep swig from her pocket-flask, wiped her mouth and continued solemnly: “Ah, Wayee, though you belonger me, allee same you never be good Cliston womans like youse ole movther, you no good—savee?”
I was invited into that little homestead. It was wonderful how neat and civilised it looked within. A grandfather’s clock ticked out its doom in the corner of the cosy parlour. On the walls were old oil paintings of English landscapes, also a few faded photographs of Benbow’s—Waylao’s father’s—relatives. The furniture was better than one might see in many a Kentish cottage. The old sailor had evidently fashioned his South Sea home so that it might be reminiscent of other days. Not the least important item of that homestead was the large barrel of rum which stood by the unused fireplace, a grim, silent symbol of what wild carousals! I, of course, knew not then that Benbow’s home-coming from sea was a mighty event in the monotonous lives of the settled beachcombers who dwelt beneath the shading palms by Tai-o-hae.