(1) Damon Gardens, Honolulu. (2) Rice Fields on Kaunai.
May 22.
Too bright and warm the morning to stay asleep even in this arboreal spot, we rose at six. Another and earlier riser played his part, that disturber of peace—the saucy mynah bird, whose matin racket is full as soothing as that of our cheerfully impudent blue jay in the Valley of the Moon. “False” mynah though he is said to be, there is nothing false about either his voice or his manners, both of which are blatantly real and sincere in their abandon. Imported from India, to feed on the cutworm of a certain moth, he has made himself more at home than any other introduced bird, and has been known to pronounce words. He is a sagacious and interesting rowdy; but could one have choice in feathered alarm clocks, the silver-throated skylark, another importation to Hawaii, would come first.
But who should complain? We had not stirred for nine solid, dreamless hours—speaking for myself, for Jack always dreams, and vividly.
In search for an ideal work-room, he pounced upon a shaded, wafty space out of doors, mountainward of the bungalow. Tochigi found a small table and box-stool for that left foot which always seeks for a rest when Jack settles to writing. A larger box serves to hold extra “tools of trade,” such as books and notes. Each morning, at home or abroad, Tochigi sharpens a half dozen or more long yellow pencils with rubber tips, and dusts the table, but never must he disturb the orderly litter of note-pads, scribbled and otherwise.
Within a couple of brisk hours, under my direction, the boy finished the work of settling, not the least item being the installing of our big Victor and some three hundred disks; then nothing would do but Jack would have me whirring off Wagnerian overtures and other orchestral “numbers” while I pattered about in Japanese sandals.
By nine, with a big palm fan I was joining him in the hammock where he hung between two huge algarobas, surrounded by a batch of periodicals forwarded from the Coast, and we felicitated ourselves upon having risen in the comparative cool of the morning and done the more active part of the day’s work. Owing to a stoppage of the blessed Trades the air was enervatingly heavy. For the past month Hawaii has known the same unusual atmospheric conditions that marked our passage. Only a mild south wind blows—the Kona, “the sick wind,” and it does seem to draw the life out of one. We are warned that when a Kona really takes charge, all things that float must look lively. Because this is not the regular season for Konas, old sea-dogs are wagging their heads.
“Do you know what you are?” I quizzed Jack, having outrun him by a word or two in the race for knowledge.
“No, I don’t. And I don’t care. But do you know where you are?” he countered.
“No, I don’t. You are a malihini—did you know that?”