`I'll have myself called early and go down to the town with Aleamotu'a. Between us we can see several of the men, and I should be able to let you know the form at breakfast. While I am down there I'll call in at the church and arrange for candles to be burned to my patron saint every day from now on for your protection.'
`Thanks, that's very good of you.' Gregory had no great faith himself in the efficacy of burning candles, but he was strongly of the opinion that anyone who had could, by so doing, draw down spiritual strength and powerful influences to aid any good purpose. After a moment he added:
`I did not know that you were a Roman Catholic:
`Oh, yes,' James replied cheerfully. `Most people in the Nakapoa group are now at least nominally Catholics, although probably three quarters of them pay only lip service to that religion. You see, the Catholic Fathers and the Protestant missionaries arrived in the South Seas at about the same period. Both, inspired by their faiths, set extraordinary examples of courage and self denial. Here, owing to the influence of France, the Fathers ultimately triumphed. But in the Fijis the Methodists proved more successful; perhaps because they brought their wives with them.'
`What difference did that make?' Gregory enquired with interest.
`For one thing, that they should have wives at all made them seem more natural and human to the natives. For another, their women, both British and American, showed remarkable bravery. With the sweat pouring off them, as it must have seeing the layers of clothes they persisted in wearing, and bitten by myriads of mosquitoes, they still went out to nurse the sick and browbeat the natives into abandoning barbaric customs.
`In the middle of the last century cannibalism was still rife in all these islands. Before his conversion to Christianity King Thakobau boasted of having eaten meat from over a thousand corpses. He employed a whole tribe of warriors from the island of Beqa to do nothing else but kidnap people to
supply his cooking ovens. Against all odds the missionaries and their wives fought with the greatest tenacity to persuade him to stop eating human flesh, and prevent a Chief's widows from being strangled and buried with him when he died:
`Do the Chiefs still practice polygamy?' Gregory asked.
James shook his head. `Not since they accepted Lotu, as Christianity is called. Many of them in the outer islands still keep concubines; but not the High Chiefs such as the Ratu’s of Fiji.'
`And how about yourself? Attached to the household of such a fine specimen of manhood I should have expected there to be half a dozen pretty young women.'
`There were four,' James admitted with a smile. `But on the morning of our arrival I sent them away. I should have, in any case, when I married, as I expected to do, a Princess of the royal families of either Fiji or Tonga. But since I met Olinda in Brazil my thoughts are all of her. I have no desire for any other woman, although it seems that the chances of making her my wife are very slender.!
'I fear that is so. As she is a Roman Catholic, that rules out a divorce. I suppose, though, as she has no children, she might manage to get an annulment?'
`Even if de Carvalho consented which I am sure he would not that would prove a long and costly business. As things are, I fear it is equally out of the question:
By then it was past one o'clock. Gregory yawned and stood up. `Since you will be getting up early in the morning I think we'd best get to bed.' From the garden there continued to come the sound of low, rather mournful, singing, and he added, `They are still at it out there. What time will they pack up?'
James looked rather surprised. `They won't. That is, not until dawn. Later, when the yaggona begins to make them a little tipsy, the singing will get a bit ragged. But the idea is that they should sing us into pleasant dreams, and they are thoroughly enjoying themselves.'
When they met for breakfast James said, `It is as I feared. Between us, Aleamotu'a and I saw five of our best divers, and they all refused to play. None of them acknowledged that it was because they had been threatened by Roboumo. They made various excuses not well enough themselves, a member of their family very ill, the loss of a job which, if they threw it up, they might not get back later on, and so on.'
Gregory nodded. 'Then it has come to a race between ourselves and the others. Immediately after breakfast we'll get off a telegram to Hunt's to send a private aircraft to fetch us and to engage rooms for us at the Grand Pacific.'
`No!' James shook his big mop of hair. `It's no good our "going to Suva. The natives on Viti Levu, with very few exceptions, don't go in any more for diving as a living. They can make more money working in the hotels, driving trucks and acting as casual labourers for the shopkeepers. We must go to the outer islands to get the type of man we want. Probably the best are to be found in the Lau Group. But that is two hundred miles to the east of the main island; and we'll have to go in a big launch to pick them up. It would be much quicker to go to the Yasawas, on this side of Viti Levu. They are no great distance from Lautoka, and you could ask Hunt's to engage a big launch for us there.'
A message to that effect was duly written out and sent down by a runner to the telegraph office. They then collected their towels and went out to have a dip in the pool. When Gregory had walked the few yards from his bedroom bure to the main one he had noticed that the sky was overcast and that there was a slight drizzle; but as they went out into the garden he was amazed at the complete change of scene from the previous day. The distant islands could no longer be seen, neither could the horns of the big bay. The sea was no longer a deep blue, nor the sky a vault of azure. For the limited distance that could now be seen beyond the harbour, the sea was grey; the yellow had gone out of the palm fronds and they now looked a darkish green. Water dripped dismally from the big, shiny leaves of the nearest trees and much of the colour seemed to have left the flowers. Altogether, it was a gloomy and depressing scene.
Remarking on the change from the two previous days,
Gregory asked, `Is it often like this?'
`Oh, yes.' James shrugged. `Sometimes it dries up in a few hours; at other's the rain goes on for weeks. When the breeze drops, as it has now, and the humidity increases, it can become very unpleasant. But we are quite used to it and everyone continues to work or go for a swim just the same.'
Gregory spent the morning reading, while James went down to the town and saw to numerous business affairs. He returned with a reply from Hunt's: an aircraft would arrive to pick them up at 1500 hours approximately, rooms had been booked for them at the Cathay Hotel, Lautoka, and arrangements about a launch were being made for them there.
Having lunched off a `fish plate' which consisted of delicious fresh crab meat, walu, the best local fish, and big prawns, followed by fruit, they were driven in the jeep down to the little airport. The weather had not improved and on the lower levels the mist was so thick that they feared the pilot might not be able to find the landing strip. But James had flares lit, and the aircraft came down safely only a quarter of an hour after its E.T.A.
Soon after they had taken off they passed out of the clouds' and caught a glimpse of Tujoa's peak rising above them. Their journey was then uneventful. Hunt's had a car ready to meet them at Nandi, and by half past six they were at the Cathay Hotel, Lautoka.
After dinner there that evening Gregory said:
`I've been thinking, James, about the next few days. As I don't speak Fijian, I should not be the least help to you in arranging with the petty Chiefs in the islands for the hire of divers; and the Mamanucas lie only a little to the south of the Yasawas. By now Manon has probably given up all hope of ever seeing me again, but I'm sure she would be pleased to; so I'd like you to drop me off on her island.'