Faery Lands of the South Seas

by James Norman Hall; Charles Nordhoff

His supply of European clothing was limited, but ample to supply my wants. He found for me three undershirts, size forty-four, two gingham outer shirts of less ample proportions, a pair of dungaree overalls, and a pair of rope-sole shoes. I asked him to put these articles aside and went off to reflect upon ways and means of opening a credit account with the canny Chinaman. There was one possible method open to me; I might adopt the pareu as a costume. I could buy three of them for the price of one undershirt, and I believed that Moy Ling would trust me to that extent. Nearly all of the natives wore pareus. They had put aside their trousers and shirts and gingham dresses now that I was no longer a stranger to them, and were much more comfortable in their simple, knee-length garments, those of the men reaching from the waist, those of the women twisted tightly under the arms. Simple and convenient though it was, I felt that it would be absurd for me to assume that style of dress, since I was not accustomed to it. Furthermore, I remembered the ridiculous appearance of Americans and Europeans I had seen at Tahiti—queer people from all sorts of queer places, who come and go through the capital of French Oceania. They rushed into pareus the moment of their arrival at Papeete, and before a week had passed were more primitive in a sophisticated way than the Tahitians themselves. I had no desire to join the ranks of the amateur cannibals, even though there was some excuse for it at Rutiaro; and I knew that the Paumotuans would have more respect for me if I dressed after the manner of my own race.

But how obtain clothing without money—without divulging to anyone that I had no money? The question dinned through my brain with annoying persistence, like the thunder of falling water on Puarei's iron roof. Would it, after all, be best to confide in the chief? I could tell him of my bank account at Papeete, and he knew, of course, that the Caleb Winship had left me without a word of warning, taking my sea chest with her. I was tempted to make a confession of my predicament, but pride or a kind of childish vanity prevented me.

"No, by Jove!" I said. "I'll be hanged if I do! Puarei, his wife—all the rest of them—expect me to live up to their traditional conceptions of white men. I am supposed to be mysteriously affluent, and I owe it to them to preserve that myth in all its romantic glamour."

I had no feeling of guilt in making this decision; rather, a sense of virtue, like that of an indulgent father upon assuring his children that there is a Santa Claus. I decided to be not only mysteriously, but incredibly, affluent. Therefore, when the rain had passed I put on my mended garments and went to Moy Ling's shop.

I found him splitting coconuts in front of his copra shed, and beckoned to him in a careless way. He came forward, smiling pleasantly as usual, but there was a shrewd glitter in his eyes which said, quite as plainly as words, "Honorable sir, I bow before you, but I expect an adequate monetary return for the service." I was not intimidated, however, and when he brought forth the articles I had selected earlier I waved them aside—all of them excepting the rope-sole shoes, the only male footgear of any kind on the island. I explained that I had not before seen the bolt of white drill—the most expensive cloth in his shop—and that I wanted enough of it to make four suits. I saw at once that I had risen in his estimation about 75 per cent, and, thus encouraged, I went on buying lavishly—white-cotton cloth for underwear and shirts; some pencils and his entire supply of notebooks for my voluminous observations on the life and character of the Paumotuans; a Night-King flash lamp; a dozen silk handkerchiefs of Chinese manufacture; a dozen pairs of earrings and four lockets and chains; ten kilos of flour and two of coffee; three bottles of perfume in fancy boxes; four large bolts of ribbon—enough to reach from one end of the village to the other; side and back combs for women, superbly ornamented with bits of colored glass; a bolt of mosquito netting; a monkey wrench; two Beacon lanterns; a pandanus mat; and one bow tie already made up, the kind sold at home in "gents' furnishings" shops.

At the beginning I had no thought of going in so recklessly. But as I went from article to article the conviction grew upon me that the deeper I plunged the greater the impression I should make upon Moy Ling, and it was essential that I should convince him that my mythical wealth was real. He became more and more deferential as my heap of purchases increased in size. I made no inquiry as to the price of anything, believing that to be in keeping with the mysteriously affluent tradition. At my back I heard a hum of excited conversation. The shop was filled with people. I felt the crush behind me, but took no notice of it and went on with my passionless orgy of spending: two bolts of women's dress goods; four pocketknives; a can of green paint and another of white—but details are tiresome. It is enough to say that I bought lavishly, and selected odds and ends of things because Moy's shop contained nothing else. He had a large supply of food, but in other respects his stock was low, and when I had finished, some of his shelves were almost bare. On one there remained only a box of chewing gum. An inscription printed on the side of it read: "Chew on, MacDuff! You can't chew out the original mint-leaf flavor" of somebody's pepsin gum—words to that effect. That product of American epicureanism is to be found, strangely enough, at nearly every Chinaman's store in the Low Archipelago. I bought twenty packages of it, since there were no other confections to be had, and distributed them among the children. The youthful MacDuffs chewed on for some thirty seconds and then swallowed, believing, in their unenlightened way, that gum is a sort of food. I had read of monkeys dying in zoos because of the same practice; but, in so far as I know, there were no ill effects from it at Rutiaro, either then or later.

I succeeded very well in impressing Puarei. He was astonished at the number of my purchases; and Poura said, "Au-e!" shooed out the mint-breathed porters who carried them to the house, and sat down in the doorway, her enormous body completely blocking the entrance. On the veranda the conversation crackled and sparkled with conjecture. I could hear above the others the voice of Paki, wife of the constable, enumerating the things I had bought. It sounded odd in Paumotuan—a high-pitched recitative of strange words, most of them adapted from the English since all of the articles were unknown to the natives before the coming of the traders—faraoa (flour), ripine (ribbon), peni (pencil or pen), taofe (coffee), etc.

I myself was wondering what use I could make of some of my wealth. The flour I would give to Puarei, and his ten-ton cutter was badly in need of paint. Poura would be glad to have the dress goods for herself and her girls, for the Rutiaroans put aside their pareus on Sunday and dressed in European costume. I could also give her the mosquito netting as a drapery for the guest bed. I had, in fact, bought it with that end in mind, for on windless nights, particularly after a rain, the mosquitoes were a fearful nuisance. Puarei's household was used to them, but I tossed and tumbled, and at last would have to paddle out on the lagoon and stay there till morning. The coffee, likewise, was for my own use, Puarei believing that the drinking of either tea or coffee was forbidden by his variety of the Christian religion. Tobacco, too, was a product of evil, and the use of it made broad the way to hell. It is impossible to believe that any missionary would wander so far to preach such theology. What had happened, very likely, was that one of the more austere churchmen who visit Rutiaro at rare intervals had condemned those white man's comforts as injurious to health. He must have been severe in his denunciation, for Puarei had got the idea that abstinence from the enjoyment of them was exacted in a sort of amendment to the Ten Commandments. I did my best to corrupt him, for breakfast at his house was to me a cheerless meal. His faith was not to be shaken, however, although he admitted that coffee drinking might not damn me, since I had been taught to believe that it would not.

I was thinking with pleasure of his tolerance and of the comforting beverage I should have the following morning when I remembered that mine was green Tahiti coffee which must be taken to Moy Ling for roasting. His shop was deserted. I could see it at the end of the sunlit street, steaming with moisture after the rain. The open doorway was a square of black shadow. It lightened with a misty glimmer as I watched, and suddenly Moy flashed into view. He ran quickly down the steps, halted irresolutely, and stood for a moment, shading his eyes with his hand, looking in the direction of Puarei's house. Then he turned, mounted the steps again, and vanished slowly in the gloom. I was uneasy, knowing what he was thinking; but an island less than three miles long, with an average width of four hundred yards, offers a poor refuge for a faint-hearted debtor. And so, having stowed my other purchases under the guest bed, I took the bag of coffee and returned to Moy's store, hoping that I might quiet his fears by increasing my obligation to him.

When one is without them, clothing, coffee, tobacco, and other such necessities assume a place of exaggerated importance, which is the reason why the memories of the earlier part of my stay at Rutiaro are tinged with the thought of them. But I had not come to the Low Islands to spend all of my time and energy in the mere fight for a comfortable existence. I could have done that quite as well at home, with greater results in the development of a more or less Crusoe-like resourcefulness. At Rutiaro the life was strange and new to me, and I found the days too short for observing it and the nights for reflecting upon it. My first interest, of course, was Puarei's household—the chief, his wife, two sons, and three daughters all housed in that one-room frame building. The room was commodious, however, about twenty-five feet by fifteen, and on the lagoon side there was a broad veranda where Poura and her daughters did much of their work and passed their hours of leisure. Behind the house was a large cistern, built of blocks of cemented coral, and a small outkitchen made of the odds and ends of packing cases and roofed with thatch.