Читать книгу The Far Lands - James Norman Hall - Страница 10

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Now Hina comes into the story, and it is told how those children, destined for one another, began their friendship. It was a vexing task Maui’s mother had given her son: that of entertaining the small granddaughter of Vaitangi. Maui was at an age when all of his interests were centered in the sports and games of boys, and he protested strongly to his mother. Why should he be asked to amuse this child of ten years? Let that be done by a daughter of one of the chiefs, a girl of Hina’s age. And his mother had said: “Maui, she is the granddaughter of Vaitangi, and she wishes to be with you. Say no more but do as I bid you.”

Now the boy stood before his father’s house, Hina waiting beside him. A score of his friends were engaged in a stilt battle on the assembly ground. Maui watched longingly the swift thrusts and parries as the boys of one side tried to overset those of the other. Presently, with an impatient sigh he turned to the child beside him.

“Would you like to see my tame frigate birds?” he asked. The child nodded and he led the way to the beach. He had a perch for the birds beneath one of the great trees there. Taking a small dip net from a crotch of the tree, he said to Hina, “Wait here.” He waded through the shallows of the lagoon to a mushroom of coral a little distance out. Mounting this, he dipped up some of the small fish that hovered around it. Beckoning to Hina he then returned to the beach. Scores of kotaha were soaring overhead, some of them so high in the air as to be scarcely visible. Maui called, and called again. Two of the birds dropped through the air like small black meteors; then, spreading their wings they checked their fall and swooped low to catch in their claws the small fish that Maui tossed up to them. A moment later they fluttered down to rest on his outstretched arm. He carried them to the perch under the tree and they hopped from his arm to the pole. Maui was a little annoyed that Hina was not more impressed by his mastery over the birds which he had reared and tamed himself.

“Do Koro boys have tame frigate birds?” he asked.

“Yes, several of them,” she replied.

“The kotaha are the birds sacred to Koro, the god of your clan,” said Maui; “but ... you see? They obey me, a Tongan.”

“Why should sea birds be sacred to any of the gods?” Hina asked.

“Because that is how it is,” Maui said. “If you were the son instead of the daughter of a chief, you would know.”

“What birds are sacred to Tané?” Hina asked.

“The itatae, ghost terns,” Maui replied, proudly. “Ask the Koro boys if ever they have been able to tame them as I do the kotaha. Tané forbids it.”

Hina made no reply but continued to regard him with a child’s serious attention.

“Well, what would you like to do next?” Maui added, impatiently.

“Whatever you wish.”

“But ... don’t you know what you want to do?”

“I am your guest. It is for you to tell me what there is to do.”

Maui replaced the dip net in the crotch of the tree and looked at her with the same air of annoyance. “There is a lake I could show you but it is high in the mountains. It would be too far for you to walk.”

Hina shook her head. “I should like to see it,” she replied.

“Come, then,” said the boy, curtly, and he set out at a fast pace along the path leading into the valley. When he reached the steep trail leading up the head wall of the valley he waited until Hina had caught up with him. “You still wish to see the lake?” he asked. “It is a long way.”

“So you told me,” Hina replied. “There was no need for you to say it a second time.”

Without replying, Maui began climbing swiftly, never pausing to look back. When he had reached the flat-topped rock at the summit he saw Hina on the path far below. When at last she had reached the rock she sat nearby, her back toward him.

“You climbed well,” Maui said.

She glanced toward him and there were tears of anger in her eyes. Presently she got to her feet. “I am ready to go on now.”

“Hina, I was angry because you had not gone home with your grandfather. I left the anger on the path up the valley wall.”

“I found it there,” she said. “It is mine, now.”

“You wish to keep it?”

She was long in replying; then, turning toward him she shook her head, smiling faintly. “But you should have shown more courtesy. You are a boy, stronger, and two years older. But I am here, as you see.”

It was at this moment that the friendship between these children began. It came of itself, unquestioned, unexplained. They sat side by side on the rock, their feet swinging below the edge of it. All the eastern lands lay outspread beneath them, golden in the early-morning sunlight.

Hina said: “Maui, do you know about the time when you Tongans came to Kurapo—your father and mother and the others in the four ships?”

The boy nodded.

“My mother has told me,” Hina went on. “I was just born and you were nothing but a little bundle of skin and bone. You would have died if my mother had not fed you at her breast, along with me. You sucked one nipple and I sucked the other. That makes you partly my brother.”

“Who says so?”

“Doesn’t it? My mother fed both of us. Puaka has never forgiven her for that. He wanted you to die, and you would have died without her milk. Your own mother says so.”

“I know, Hina. She has told me. I’m sorry I was so rude to you this morning.”

“You should be; and for the time when I was here before, a year ago. You didn’t even notice me.”

“Oh, yes I did.... Look, Hina.” He turned to the mountain wall towering above them. “You see the great gap in the ridge on the north side? Do you know who made it?”

“Yes; it was Kamaloa, a great warrior in the time of the demigods. One of his enemies was hiding behind the ridge. Kamaloa hurled a huge stone. It struck the ridge and tore out the rocks there.”

“Kamaloa! There was no demigod of that name,” Maui replied. “It was Tumu-the-Witless. He tore the rock out with his hands, in one great piece. And when he threw it the rock hit the reef and made the fine passage to the sea.”

Hina shook her head. “It couldn’t have been. Don’t you think my father knows? The Koros came here long before the Tongans.”

“That has nothing to do with it,” Maui replied, warmly. “Don’t you think my father knows? And Taio? Taio lives with us. He knows the stories of all the demigods and all of their names. There is no Kamaloa among them.”

They argued about this and at last Hina said: “Maui, what does it matter? I don’t care who made the hole. I want to see the lake you were going to show me.”

“But you ought to know the truth,” Maui said. “It was Tumu, just after he and his brother, Mano-the-Strong, fished Kurapo out of the sea. And then ...”

“All right; it was Tumu. Now will you take me to the lake?”

They followed the path which rose gently before them, along fern-covered ridges and through wide stretches of woodland until it turned seaward once more and came into the open along the high cliffs bordering the northern coast. They halted now and then to peer over the walls of rock that fell sheer to the sea, a thousand feet below. Hina showed no signs of weariness now. Though he said nothing Maui was impressed by her sturdiness, and she was as sure-footed as himself. As they were resting for a moment, Maui said: “I want to show you something else before we go to the lake. Have you seen the tabu tree? That is as far as we Tongans can go.”

Hina shook her head. “I don’t care to see it. I wish there was no tabu so that you could come to our valley whenever you wanted to.”

“We’re nearly there,” Maui insisted, “and I want you to see it.” He went on, Hina following, until they saw the tree clearly outlined against the sky. When they reached it they stood for a moment, gazing at the tabu sign fluttering in the breeze and directly over the path.

“We’ll rest here,” said Maui. “It’s getting warm in the sun. I’ll get some fern to make wreaths for our heads.” He then walked with an air of proud indifference past the tabu sign, into the forbidden lands of the Koros, plucked an armful of fern, and returned.

“Is that why you brought me here, to show me how brave you are?” Hina said.

Maui felt a flush of shame. It was as though they had changed ages and he were a little boy, much younger than Hina. And he felt even more foolish when he replied, as though against his will: “I’ve walked past it several times, and I will do it whenever I please.”

“Because you know I would never speak of it,” said Hina.

“How could I know? You belong to the Koros.”

“Why do you tell me that so often?” Hina said. “I don’t think of your family or my family as Tongans or Koros. But be careful of Uri! He is a Koro and nothing else, like his uncle, Puaka.”

Maui flushed at the mention of Uri’s name. “You saw what he did when I spoke to him, the morning you came?”

“You paid him well for that,” Hina said. “I was happy when you beat him in the stone-slinging match.”

Maui gazed soberly at her. “You wanted me to?”

“Why not? I hate him and I hate his uncle! But remember, Maui! Uri will never forgive you for winning. He will wait for a chance to do you harm—real harm.... Let’s not speak of him any more. Now I want to see the lake.”

On their way inland Maui spied a jungle hen on her nest. Motioning Hina to wait he crept slowly through the underbrush and seized the bird. There was only one egg beneath her. He felt the legs and breast of the hen.

“She’s fat,” he said. “Are you hungry? ... Then we’ll cook it. There is a place a little farther along where we can get some fei to eat with it.”

They came to a sunny glade where a pool of clear cold water was fed by a small stream from above. Here they halted and Maui removed a sharkskin wallet attached to the belt of his waist mat. In it were his fire stick, his sling, and a bamboo knife. He slit the fowl’s throat and laid it in a clump of fern. “We’ll have a fine meal,” he said. “Now I’ll get the fei.” He returned presently with half a dozen mountain plantains and the dead limb of a purau tree. Seating himself on a boulder he broke off the butt end of the branch and placed it between his knees. “I’m ready,” he said. “Get some leaves and twigs.”

Hina gathered these and knelt beside him. Placing the sharp end of his fire stick against the soft bone-dry wood, Maui began slowly until he had it well grooved. He then worked with rapidly increasing strokes until a faint wisp of smoke appeared in the wood dust at the end of the groove. Hina bent down, breathing gently upon it, and when the spark of fire appeared she fed it with crumbled leaves, twigs, and larger sticks until a good fire was burning briskly. Maui singed off the feathers of the fowl, split it apart and cleaned it in the stream, while Hina laid the plantains on the coals to roast, turning them as Maui broiled the fowl. The juices sizzling down upon the glowing coals sent up a tantalizing fragrance. When the food was ready they let it cool for a time and then ate ravenously.

“Maui, what would our fathers say if they could see us here?”

“Eating together?”

Hina nodded. “This time we have both broken a tabu.”

“Tell me about your father,” Maui said. “Why does he never come to our valley?”

“I don’t know. It may be because Puaka doesn’t want him to come. He’s away now with the war fleet.”

“Does he like Puaka?”

Hina shook her head. “But he honors him because he is so great a warrior.”

“Do you see them when they come home?”

“The war fleet? Never.”

“Why not?”

“No children see them. But the boys do when they are as old as you.”

“I would like to,” Maui said.

“No you wouldn’t! Not the day they come. It’s horrible!”

“How do you know if you haven’t seen them?”

“I know what they do. On the evening of that day they kill the first of the prisoners they bring home. They take the bodies to the marae to sacrifice to Koro.”

“Is your grandfather there?”

“Of course. He’s the high chief. My father, too.”

“I can’t think of your grandfather being there,” Maui said.

“He must be. Koro demands it.... Maui, don’t speak of it any more! Let’s go on now. I want to see the lake.”

It was well past midday when they reached the borders of the lake. Forest land enclosed it on the eastern side, with a wide beach sloping down to the water. On the opposite side was a steep-walled terrace of rock, like a gigantic step from the central mountain whose peak, weathered by the winds and rains of ages, showed spires and pinnacles with patches of blue sky between. Others rose from the terrace below. High above them ghost terns and tropic birds sailed back and forth, their reflections in the lake clear at one moment, blurred the next by flaws of wind sweeping across the water.

Hina gazed wonderingly about her. “What a beautiful place!”

“You see the holes high up on the crags?” Maui said. “That’s where the ghost terns nest. They are just beginning now. In another month the baby terns will be hatching.”

“Have you climbed up there?”

“Of course. Often.”

“Of all sea birds I love the ghost terns best,” Hina said.

“Better than kotaha, the birds of Koro?”

“Maui, they are not! Any more than ghost terns belong to Tané. They belong to themselves, and to the sky and the sea. Could you get me a pair of baby terns when they hatch?”

“They can’t be tamed like the kotaha. When they’re grown they’ll fly away. But it’s fun to raise them.”

“Then I want to. Will you get me a pair of little ones?”

“How could I send them to you?”

Hina reflected for a moment. “I’ll come for them. Bring them as far as the tabu tree, but stay on your side! I’ll have to come with one of my mother’s servants. How long will it be?”

“Ten days from now will be the first night of the new moon. Could you come on the first day of the moon to follow that? The terns will be hatching well by then.”

“Yes,” said Hina. “You won’t forget?”

“Tongans don’t forget their promises. I will be there early and wait till you come.” Maui glanced at the sun. “There is something else I want to show you,” he said, “but it isn’t time yet. While we’re waiting I’ll make some little boats.”

He gathered some small straight twigs, leaves from a hotu tree, and a length of smooth bark which he stripped down with his thumbnail for cordage. Hina watched, her hands clasped around her knees, as Maui shaped the bits of wood and smoothed them with a sharp-edged fragment of shell.

“How can you do it so fast?”

Maui gave her a quick glance as he worked. “Because I’m a Tongan,” he said. “Can’t the Koro boys make these little things?”

“Not as pretty as yours, and it takes them much longer.”

“These are nothing. Wait till you see my voyaging ship. I was a long time making that.”

“A voyaging ship?”

The boy nodded. “It’s a model, exactly like the great ships we Tongans build for the voyages eastward.”

“But ... the Tongans don’t make voyages. You stay here on Kurapo.”

“You think so? We won’t stay much longer.”

“Why not?”

“Because we have to search for the Far Lands of Maui.”

“Where are they?” Hina asked.

“I’ll tell you about that some other time.... Look, Hina, they’re ready. This one is for you. Be careful! Set it gently in the water. We’ll see which one sails best.”

The breeze was so light that it barely ruffled the surface of the water, but the tiny craft skimmed lightly over it until they were far out on the lake. Hina was delighted and Maui said: “Now I’ll make another kind, so light that even this little breeze will make them skip out of the water.”

“Where is the place you were going to show me? I’d like to see that first.”

“It isn’t time to go yet,” Maui said.

“Why not?”

“Because I say it isn’t.”

“You don’t want me to see it; that’s why.”

“Listen, Hina! It’s a dangerous place to get into; the light must be just right when we start. Are you a good swimmer?”

“I can swim as well as any boy.”

“And dive, too?”

“Of course.”

“Show me,” Maui said. “Swim across the lake, and when you come back dive as far as you can.”

The lake was little more than three hundred paces wide. Hina threw off her mantle. Loosening the kirtle beneath she wrapped it more tightly, bringing one end up between her legs, tucking it securely at the waist; then she plunged into the water. Maui watched closely, with increasing assurance, seeing how thoroughly at home she was. The rocky wall fell sheer on the far side of the lake. When she reached it Hina turned, gave a strong push with her legs and started back, swimming easily. When about fifty paces from the beach she dived and broke water in the shallows where Maui was sitting.

“You’re like a little porpoise,” Maui said as she threw herself on the sand beside him. He glanced at the crags across the lake; the sun was now hidden behind them. “Soon we can go, but rest a little and get your breath.”

A few moments later he led the way across the lake until they had nearly reached the western wall. Maui said: “Swim now with your face in the water. You will see a dark place below a ledge in the cliff. Keep watching it.”

Presently Hina raised her head. “What is it, Maui? There’s light coming through!”

“That’s where we are going. Take some deep breaths. I’ll dive first. Follow right after me.”

As Maui’s head broke water inside the cavern he turned quickly and saw Hina rising to the surface just behind him. The shaft of sunlight coming through the rocky vault was growing brighter; it fell directly on the ledge of rock along the far side of the cavern. They swam there and pulled themselves up on it.

“Were you frightened?” Maui asked.

The child nodded. “I couldn’t have held my breath any longer.”

“Now you know why I wanted you to wait. You can see the way to come in only when the light is coming through that hole. Have you ever heard Koro boys speak of this place?”

Hina shook her head. “I don’t believe they ever come here.”

“I have many times, with my friends, but none of them know about this cave; I believe I was meant to find it. Métua, our priest ...” He broke off, staring blankly at Hina.

“What is it, Maui?”

“I forgot. I shouldn’t have brought you here.”

“Why not?”

“I have disobeyed our priest. He gave me something to hide in a secret place. I brought it here. And now you know!”

Hina glanced around the great cavern where the dark water seemed to stretch away into limitless recesses. “But I don’t know,” she replied. “I don’t know what it is or where it is. So you have done nothing wrong.”

Maui got to his feet. “I’m going to show you what it is,” he said. “Métua must have meant you to know. I couldn’t have brought you here without his consent.” Moving slowly along the ledge he searched along the wall until he found the coral pebble in its net of bark thread.

Hina examined it curiously. “What is it?” she asked. Maui told of his punishment at school; how he was made to suck the pebble. “And this is what I had to say when I first placed it in my mouth.” Then, as at school, the pebble in his mouth, he mumbled: “I, Maui, son of Téaro, am deeply at fault, and I willingly suck this pebble.”

Hina’s laughter made the walls ring. “Did you have to suck it long?”

“It makes my jaws ache just to think of it.”

“You must tell your priest,” Hina said. “I don’t believe he will mind your telling me, but if he does, then you can hide the pebble in some other place.”

Maui returned the pebble to its niche in the wall. “I think he will tell me first. Our priest knows everything.”

The sun had now passed the opening in the roof and the gloom was gradually deepening. “We’d better go now,” Hina said, anxiously.... “Maui, we must hurry! We won’t be able to find the way!”

“Don’t be afraid. When it’s dark enough you will see the opening by the light that comes from the lake.” The gloom deepened until they could no longer see one another. A light much fainter than that by which they had entered now revealed the passage. “You see it, Hina?”

“Yes,” the child replied. “I’m going, before I’m too scared to try it. Come right behind me!”

In the last faint light of day two weary children crossed the assembly ground to the house of Téaro.

“You were right, Maui,” Hina said. “It was a long way.”