It was a woman—so much I could make out, in spite of the distance, some three hundred yards as the crow flies, though more, of course, by the dip between the two hills—a woman, by the rounded contours of the silhouette, and a tall one. Of her face, I could as yet say nothing: she was looking out to sea.
A woman, then, but of what tribe? There was no telling by the dress. She wore a petticoat of some dark material, reaching to the knee. It was but a dark patch, of course, as I saw it; and above it was the white one of another garment. At first, that was all I made out—the patch of dark, the patch of white, with the half tint that stood for her bare limbs. She seemed to be shading her eyes with her hand, as she stood in the glare of light.
Suddenly she wheeled round, as though to descend the peak, and, in doing it, saw me. We were now face to face, she on the higher summit, I on the lower, with only the valley between us. I could not see her features, but she seemed rooted to the spot with astonishment.
I instinctively felt for a weapon. I expected a scream or a signal, and savage warriors trooping over the hill. But she made no sign. Hesitation was out of the question: I moved straight towards her. I had no beads about me for a peace-offering, so I fumbled at my watch chain, and wrenched off a propitiatory pencil-case that I hoped might serve.
She advanced too. Then, at every step, the bands of light and dark began to develop into the most majestic shape of youthful womanhood I had ever seen. The white was evidently a sleeveless undergarment reaching, like the petticoat of deep blue, no further than the knee. The naked arms, legs, and feet were no darker than the cheek of a brunette. The chemise was low, and above it rose the glorious bust, almost as broad as a man’s, and with a virgin firmness of line that was strength and softness too. She was very tall for her sex, tall even for mine, but the perfect proportion between body and limbs took off all effect of ungainliness. She moved with the beautiful poise and precision of a mountaineer, brushing hillock, tuft, and boulder in the slope, as though they formed but one level.
Would she attack? It looked so, else why had she met my advance so boldly, without calling her tribe? She seemed to have taken the measure of me for single combat. She would have been a formidable foe, in any case, to say nothing of the handicapping in respect for the sex.
But there was no more of aggression than there was of flight in her attitude, as she paused at last, when but a few feet parted us, and looking down on me in placid wonder, from large and lustrous eyes, showed me the peculiar beauty of her face. Her features were regular, without being faultlessly, or rather, faultily so. Her complexion would have passed muster for fairness in Provence, if not farther north. The only signs of race type were in a certain prominence of the brow, and in the deep liquid softness of the gaze. I had seen such eyes in some of the Coral Islands, and I used sometimes to wish we could take a pair of them back with us, to put the Italian women out of conceit with their own. Her lips were rather full and sensuous, but this did not impair the tender dignity of her expression. Her dark hair, shining, I regret to say, with some native oil, which, even at a distance, I could perceive was scented, seemed to have been caught up with one sweeping gesture, and gathered in a knot behind. Her feet were rather large, though perfectly formed; and she had drawn them close together, as she paused, like a child toeing the line in school. To complete the similitude, she stood perfectly straight, with her arms folded behind her, and her head thrown back—her bosom, the while, gently rising and falling with excitement but half suppressed, and carrying with it, in its motion, her sole ornament, a common English navy button, fastened with ribbon to her throat. I had looked on other women as beautiful in feature, but never on one so magnificently formed. It recalled poetic ideals of the youth of the race.
Evidently she was waiting for me to say something, but how was I to say it? The whole Melanesian mission might have been at fault in the speech of this solitary isle. So I began toying with the pencil-case once more, and then, in a desperate attempt to recall some characters of a universal sign language, I folded my hands on my breast—as I had once seen it done by savages of wilder aspect, in a ballet in Leicester Square.
No language in the world could do justice to my astonishment at what followed, and therefore I set it down without comment, just as it passed.
‘You speak English, I suppose,’ said the girl. ‘How did you come on the Island?’