“Foul! Foul! ’E ’it’ im, ’hand’ e’s hon ’is ’ands hand kneeses,” exclaimed the Australian woman.
The audience took up the chorus in French, Tahitian, and English. Though Opeta had won them all by his ability and fairness and was plainly the better man, the sentiment was for the rules. The Christchurch Kid thought a moment, and conferred with the announcer, who talked with all the seconds. The spectators were insistent, and though loath to end the show, the Kid held up the gloved hand of the Mataiean.
The announcer declared him the “champignon” of Papeete, but naïvely declared that Opeta was still full of fight, and challenged the universe. The Raratonga man was dumfounded at the result of his forgetfulness, and gazed coldly and accusingly at the red plaits. The people, too, now regretted their enthusiasm for the right, which had shortened their program of rounds, and demanded that the battle go on. But the band had left, the lights were dimmed, and gradually the crowd departed.
The Australian waited to shake the hand of her knight, to whom she said:
“I bloomin’ well knew you ’d do ’im hup! ’E’s got nothin’ hin ’is right. ’E’s a runaw’y, ’e is.”
David and I went into the buffet of the cinema after the fight to hear the arguments over it, and he to collect bets. He had chosen the winner by the toss of a coin. The French Governor of the Paumotus was there, gaily bantering half a dozen girls for whom he bought drinks. We joined him with Miri and Caroline and Maraa and others, the best-known sirens of Papeete. They were handsome, though savage-looking, and they had lost their soft voices. Alcohol and a thousand upaupahuras had made them shrill. They smoked endless cigarettes. Some wore shoes and stockings, and some were barefooted. Their dresses were red or blue, with insertions of lace and ribbons, and they were crowned with flowers in token of their mood of gaiety.
David insisted on a bowl of velvet, three quarts of champagne, and three of English porter mixed in a great urn. The champagne bubbled in the heavier porter, and the brew was a dark, brilliant color, soft and smooth. It was delicious, and seemed as safe as cocoanut milk. I drank my share of it in the cinema cafe, and after that was conscious only vaguely of going to the Cocoanut House garden, where Miri and Caroline and Maraa danced nude under the trees by the light of the full moon.
Then came blankness until I awoke several hours after midnight. I was sitting on the curbing of the Pool of Psyche, and some one was holding my hand. I thought it must be Atupu or Lovaina, and groped for a moment before I could pull my senses together. I looked up, and saw a wreathed and bearded native, and then down and saw his attire, mixed man’s and woman’s, and knew he was one of the mahus who loafed about the queen’s grounds. I drew away my hand as from a serpent’s jaws, and clasped my head, which rocked in anguish. A horrid chuckle or dismal throaty sound caused me to see the Dummy standing in the gateway, looking contemptuously at me, and witheringly at my companion. I had a second’s thought of myself as a son of Laocoön.
The mahu got up and hastened away, and Vava put his hand on my shoulder and lifted me as a child to the road. He pointed toward the Annexe, and as I went haltingly with him, he now and again uttered unearthly cackles and bawls as if enjoying a farce I could not see. He, like the mahu, was one of those mishaps of nature assigned to play an absurd and sorry part in the tragicomedy of life in which all must act the rôles assigned by the great author-manager until death puts us out of the cast. In that scene I myself was the buffoon of fate.