“Tatini,” I said, “the nono was the Tahitian arrow of a little fat god we have called Cupid.”
“Aue!” she replied. “It was not always oaoa for him, because it might be an old woman, or some one he did not like, but who loved him. The Arii, the aristocratic ladies, no matter how old, threw nono at the youngest and handsomest youth, and they had to pursue them, because of good manners. You know, Maru, that an illegitimate child is called to-day taoranono, and taora means to throw.”
“When I was in Hawaii,” I told her, “the old natives used to talk of a game there which, under King Kalakaua, their next to last sovereign, was played at night in Iolani palace or in the garden, but a ball of twine took the place of the nono, and all stood about, men and women, in a circle, to speed and receive the token of passion. The missionaries severely condemned the game.”
At the Maison des varos I breakfasted alone, for Tatini was too shy to break the taboo that separated the sexes at meals. Butscher waited on me, bringing one plate of ambrosia after another—oysters, shrimp, varos, and fish. I warmed his frigid blood with a cup or two of Pol Roger, 1905, a bottle of which he dragged from a cave.
“I am born in Papenoo,” he volunteered, “fifty-three years ago. My father came from Alsace seventy-five years ago, when Tahiti had not many white people. I am a tinsmith, but I gave up that business many years ago to keep this maison. I was a catechist in the Catholic church here nine years, teaching the ignorant. I gave it up; it didn’t pay. I got nothing out of it. I worked about the church, read the prayers, and led the service when the priest was not there, and I never made a penny. Everything for me was the future life. Vous savez, monsieur, toute à l’avenir! Sacré! what a fool I was! Mais, one day when I was lying on that table as you found me, I was iiii, and I dreamed that there was no hell and that I was a fool. I turned over a new leaf that moment. Now I never go near the church, and the future can take care of itself. That’s my son-in-law going by in the cart. He’s the richest young man in Taravao. Ah, oui! he’ll spend a hundred francs here with me in a week for drinks. That’s their baby.”
Butscher’s leathern, yellow visage contracted in an appalling grin.
“They have been married long?” I remarked politely.
“Mais, they are not married yet,” replied the father-in-law. “There is no hurry.”
Leaving Tatini to her own pleasures, I rented a horse and cart of Mephistopheles and drove into the district of Vairao. From the outset I realized the iniquitous character of the Atua who had tried to destroy or set adrift the people of the presqu’ile of Taiarapu, for they were handsomer and, if possible, more hospitable than those of Tahiti-nui. The road was closer to the water of the lagoon, and the reef and coral banks were nearer. I allowed the horse to go his own gait, and we jogged slowly, stopping to browse and to consider the landscape. The beach was covered with seeds and pods, the square-shaped seeds of the Barringtonia in their outer case of fiber, tutui-nuts, cocoanuts, flowers and bits of wood, and objects that would cause a naturalist to weep for lack of time. Our beaches of the temperate zones are wastes compared with these, for not only were the sands strewn with a vast débris of forest and jungle, but animal life abounded. The hermits toddled about, carrying their stolen shells, some as small as watch charms, and the land-crabs fed on the purauand hibiscus-leaves. They are the scavengers of the shore, eating everything, and thus acting as conservators of health, as do the lank pigs of the Philippines. They were in myriads, rushing about seemingly without purpose, and diving into their holes beneath the palm-roots. Their legs, unshelled, are as excellent food as the crabs of the Atlantic. In the water a foot or two away moved exquisite creatures, darting fish, and sailing craft—Portuguese men-of-war, and other almost intangible shapes of pearly hue.
The village of Vaieri is opposite the pass of Tapuaeraha. Far from the capital, and from the distractions of tourists and bureaucracy, this tiny group of homes along the beach was less touched by the altering hand of the white than Mataica, its setting and atmosphere affectingly unspoiled. There was a mildness, a reticence, a privacy surrounding the commune that bespoke a gentle people, living to themselves. It was almost at the end of the belt road, which virtually terminated at Puforatiai. Gigantic precipices, high cliffs, and rugged mountains forbade travel, and from a boat only could one see the extreme southern end of Tahiti-nui Marearea, Great Tahiti the Golden, as it was called by its once proud race.