The Episode of the Imp

By RALPH STOCK

IME passes, even in the Islands. Felisi of Luana had reached the mature age of sixteen.

And things had happened—drastic things that have a habit of changing the whole aspect of life. No longer was she called upon by her father to adventure forth from the family roof-tree and wrest from a grudging world the wherewithal to purchase such luxuries as his advanced tastes demanded. Such excursions were no more, so that for Felisi the curtain was rung down on the thrilling drama of other people's business. Henceforth she must attend to her own. That is why we come upon her engaged in nothing more romantic than turning the handle of a borrowed sewing-machine.

It came hard at first. For the matter of that, and after eighteen months of eventless Luana, it still came hard at times, and she paused in her work to gaze wistfully through the doorway and across the stretch of sparkling Pacific that separated her from the great "outside."

What was happening over there? she wondered. Who was now dispensing imitation pink coral on Suva's crowded wharves, or lending a helping hand where it was needed—and sometimes where it was not—in the multifarious and intricate problems of human existence? In short, how was the world continuing to survive without her? She was sorry for it—as sorry for the world in its bereavement as she occasionally was for herself.

Such a mood was upon her now, for a white man had come to live at Luana, a white man of an entirely new pattern, sparse as to hair at the temples, almost blind, to judge by the size of tortoiseshell-rimmed sun-glasses that he wore, thoughtful of countenance, and content to sit in a cane chair under a mango tree for longer than Felisi had ever seen a white man sit in any one place.

True, he occasionally wrote letters with a chewed pencil on flimsy paper, and as often tore up what he had written, but for the most part he merely sat there in the little square of croton-bordered garden before the house he had acquired, staring into vacancy.

So much she knew from casual observation, but what of the rest? Who was he? Why was he? In fact, what about him? It was still a physical impossibility, then, for Felisi to live in the neighbourhood of a mystery without trying to solve it? She was afraid so.

Towards evening she found herself ornamenting her hair with a red hibiscus blossom, donning her most striking sulu, and practising her smile. Why? Well, such things play a more prominent part in the elucidation of mysteries than might be supposed. Besides, it was necessary to fill the bamboo with drinking water, and the path to the spring led past her new neighbour's abode, and—and is it not permissible to look as attractive as possible, anyway? Leaving the sewing-machine in a state of suspended animation, Felisi set out. At the croton hedge she paused for breath, but was allowed to proceed without so much as a glance in her direction. It was strange, but not past remedy. On the return journey she came swinging down the hill, a truly devastating apparition. Precisely at the croton hedge the water bamboo needed readjustment to the accompaniment of a hummed meke air. But nothing happened—nothing whatsoever.

That was why, a few minutes later, Garnet was brought back from a particularly promising flight of fancy to things practical by a mango dropping fair and square in the middle of his manuscript. It was a disturbing occurrence, but when he came to think of it, the wonder was it had not happened before, considering the heavily-laden state of the tree overhead and the litter of fruit about the garden. This last would have to be attended to. There were several things that needed attending to, and that was as far as Garnet usually got in attending to them. But on this occasion it seemed providential that a native of some sort was staring at him over the hedge.

"Hi!" he called. "You want mango?" He indicated the untidy garden with a wave of the hand.

The "native of some sort" seemed unimpressed with the possibilities in mangoes. Or was it that she failed to understand?

"Mango!" repeated Garnet, stabbing the air in their direction with the chewed pencil. "Plenty mango, savvy?"

Felisi pouted, then smiled. She was equally adept at either.

"Me get you," she said brightly, displaying her latest linguistic achievement fresh garnered from an American schooner.

It had the desired effect. Garnet removed his sun-glasses, levered himself out of the chair, and strolled over to the hedge.

"Oh, so you get me, do you?" he observed, also and unconsciously observing those qualities in Felisi of Luana that he had been intended to. "Well, what about it?"

He looked considerably younger without the glasses, Felisi reflected, and he had kind eyes. There was a button missing from his shirt, and a hole in one of his socks. A freshly crumpled letter protruded from the left pocket of his duck jacket. His manner was of the bluff, playful order universally adopted by white folk in dealing with children, dogs, and natives, but it was assumed, she decided. He was not really like that.

"Clear them up, and you can have them," he continued. "How would that do?"

"You no like 'em mango," suggested Felisi.

"Hate 'em," said Garnet.

"Me, too," admitted Felisi.

Garnet laughed. Refreshing little imp, he told himself. Evidently had ideas of her own, and, after all, why not? Wonderful eyes, and what hair, and skin, and carriage! But it was the possibility of a mind that intrigued Garnet. What if she actually had one? And if she had, what did it harbour? Rather interesting, that—life through a Kanaka's eyes. Entirely new viewpoint. He wondered That was his trade.

His wonder grew as the sun-drenched days passed by, and each evening Felisi appeared with a reed basket to relieve him of some of the mangoes—never all, because that would have ended the visitations, but sufficient to make a showing before she squatted at his feet, and they indulged in a sort of mango social. It was a quaint occasion, but they both enjoyed it.

"What about the princess and the poor man?" suggested Garnet. "You might let me have that again, will you?"

"You like 'im, eh?" questioned Felisi.

"Very much," said Garnet. "But there's something wrong with the end. They were drowned, weren't they?"

Felisi regarded him reproachfully.

"Them no drowned," she said. "Them marry."

"But how can that be if they dived together off a cliff higher than Suva church because the king wouldn't let them, and never came up again?"

"Me no say them never come up again," protested Felisi, in injured tones. "Me no finish."

"Ah, I see," murmured Garnet, leaning back in his chair. "Another powerful instalment in our next, eh? Well, fire ahead."

"Them dive," proceeded Felisi dramatically, "down, down, an' never come up"

"There you are," said Garnet.

"—never come up three—six days," continued Felisi, ignoring the interruption.

"Jove, they must have had a pair of lungs on them!" came another that met with a like fate.

"King him think them finish, but"

"Ah!" breathed Garnet.

"—poor man him hunt plenty turtle. Him see turtle go in cave under sea. Him take princess in cave."

"And I suppose, when they did, come out, the king was so pleased to see his daughter again that he made the poor man a chief, and let them marry."

Felisi nodded gravely. "How you know?" she demanded.

"I have an instinct in these things," said Garnet.

Felisi decided it was a disappointing process to recount Island history to people with instinct, whatever that might be. It robbed the narrator of a legitimate and hard-earned climax.

"You now," she announced, after sitting in silence, while Garnet produced reflective smoke clouds that hung on the still air above his head.

"What's that?" he exclaimed, with the sudden dread of his species that something was expected of him.

"You now," repeated Felisi, with quiet insistence.

Garnet leant forward in his chair.

"But—I don't know anything," he faltered. "Besides, I come from a cold, uninteresting place where princesses don't dive off cliffs or—or do anything like that."

"You write plenty letter," accused Felisi, with seeming irrelevance.

"Letters? Yes, I suppose I do," admitted Garnet, on reflection. "I must write quite a lot of letters, Heaven help me!"

"What for you write 'em?"

Garnet pondered the matter, perceiving that it was, in truth, "his turn now." "Money mostly," he stated truthfully.

"Plenty friend belong you, eh?"

"A fair number."

"An' you write 'em letter for money?"

"In a way—that is, yes."

Felisi relapsed into silence. The mystery was solved. She had no idea that writing to one's friends for money was such a remunerative proceeding.

There followed further cursory conversation, possibly a cup of tea, and Felisi's departure, impeded by the laden reed basket.

Such were the mango socials, and they continued with marked success for nearly a month. But there was a calendar in Garnet's house—an advertisement of the local shipping company, whereon was printed, in small blue letters, "S.S. Levu arrives Malita"—and a calendar is a mistaken thing to have in the Islands, as will shortly be demonstrated.

"Only another three days," he told Felisi one evening, "and we shall have another playmate in our garden. What d'you think of that?"

Felisi was diligently eradicating mangoes, and Garnet was staring into the tangled branches overhead with a smile of pleasurable anticipation, so he failed to observe the sudden cessation in harvesting operations, and the expression on Felisi's face as she scrambled to her feet and came towards him.

"Playmate all right?" she inquired gravely.

"Very much so," said Garnet. "Of course, I may be prejudiced, but that's my opinion, and I think it will be yours. You see, she knows so well how to play, and as for stories, she's chockablock with 'em."

"Playmate belong you?"

"As much as a wife does these days," said Garnet. "I think we ought to be very happy together, don't you?"

Judging by the dazzling smile with which Felisi answered the question, she did.

"Me now," she informed him pleasantly. "All the same story. Playmate belong me him all right. Him know how to play an' tell plenty story. Him" And, with that, she turned and fled.

Which left Garnet thinking. What did she mean? Why had she gone? He fumbled blindly for his pipe, and presently the uncomfortable truth began to dawn. Yet what had he done? Nothing that could account for his present state of mind. Unintentionally, unconsciously even, he had won the affection of this child, and the realisation of it filled his susceptible soul with pity. He was probably her world, and she would be an exile after to-night. She resented the intrusion of another.… Poor little imp! Yet what had she meant?

It was purely by accident that he came to know. A few mornings later—on the same portentous day that heralded his wife's arrival by the Levu—he was awakened by unaccustomed sounds—the sonorous beating of a lali interspersed with the murmur of many voices and occasional shouts.

It seemed incredible that Luana could be responsible for such a disturbance, but on sauntering forth and taking up a position on the hillside overlooking the village, he found it to be a fact. The place resembled a disturbed ant-heap. People issued from grass houses or entered them on ceaseless missions. Others streamed into the metropolis from all quarters, along the main tracks, through the palm groves, across the beach from a young fleet of canoes. And all carried something, a bale of sinnet, a pig ready trussed, a turtle, finely woven mats, taro, breadfruit, which they added to an ever-growing pyramid beside the Chief's house. Fires sprang into being, sending up their blue spirals of smoke on the still air.

It was a common or garden meke Garnet decided. They would dance and gormandise until the following morning, perhaps longer. He settled down to be quietly bored. But in both respects he was wrong. There was an orderliness about the proceedings foreign to any meke he had ever witnessed, and he watched with ever-growing interest.

At a given signal from the lali, the apparently undisciplined horde split asunder, the men to one side of the compound, the women to the other. So they waited, squatting in serried ranks, chanting softly, swaying rhythmically, until a small, upright figure, resplendent in fluted sulu and scarlet drala blossoms, appeared in the Chief's doorway. It was a girl. It was Garnet's "imp" of tender memory. From then onward no detail of the proceedings escaped him. The chant swelled to a roar of welcome. For a moment the child paused, as though stricken with awe before the multitude. It was the correct thing, and equally correct to be thrust from the house of her father towards the outstretched arms of the women-folk. But they would have none of her. She was not for them, their pantomime implied. They laughed as they thrust her from them to the accompaniment of the swelling chant. Her entreaties were heart-rending, but, finding them futile, she turned, to behold a man advancing upon her from the opposing ranks of males.

In feigned terror she fled from this menace of a particularly amiable-looking bronze giant, until, all sanctuary being denied her, she was caught up in his powerful arms and borne forth from the compound, down the beach, and through thigh-deep water to the waiting, flower-bedecked canoe. The paddles dipped, the happy pair stood laughing and waving a farewell as they glided up the coast and were lost to view in the shimmering heat haze.

Such was the quaint marriage ceremony that afforded Garnet a last glimpse of his "poor little imp." After lifelong interest in other people's business, Felisi had at last attended to her own.