The Smell of Evil Page 4

  Herbert sometimes thought that his career had been an undistinguished one and that now he could never expect to rise to any great heights. When this feeling of failure came upon him May would become as impatient with him as it was possible for her to be. It was not, she said quite forcibly, necessarily the Bishops and the high dignitaries of the Church who undertook the most important work, although she could not but agree that they were all of them fine and upright men. It was someone like Herbert who really counted in the eyes of God, a man who was selfless, and who asked for nothing for himself, one who had dedicated the whole of his life to the spiritual and physical well-being of the backward communities among whom he had been sent, and whole sole desire had been to serve. “And no one,” she would say, “no one is more self denying than you, and no one has a greater gift for making converts enjoy their religion. Under your guidance Christianity is for them a case of Te Deum rather than, as is so often the case I am afraid, one of tedium.” She used to smile brightly when she made this little joke.

  They were the only white people on the island. When Queen Victoria had died during the previous year it had taken the news six months to reach them. Although they had not visited England for a decade they felt the loss as keenly as if it had been a personal bereavement, and Herbert had made the deceased monarch, with her many admirable virtues, the subject of his next address in the rickety corrugated iron church that he had caused to be built on the outskirts of the main center on Namavava, which was merely a straggle of extremely primitive dwellings that housed some six hundred souls.

  Herbert’s thick fair hair was already graying, while May’s had been for a long time a mixture of pepper and salt in which the latter predominated. In appearance they were strangely alike, both being on the heavy side, both constantly smiling with a sincere and determined benignity, both viewing the world through thick spectacles. Despite the tropical sun there was scarcely a line on their faces, which resembled ripe and downy apricots.

  Their own house had been erected on a narrow plateau about a hundred yards from, and fifty feet above, the winding village. It was perched on a forest of squat bamboo stilts and encircled by a shaded verandah to which access was given by half a dozen steps. The walls were of woven bamboo and the roof had been thatched with palm. In addition to the verandah, where the majority of their scant free time was spent, there was a bedroom, a living room and, built on to the back, a more spacious annex which served as May’s workroom and dispensary, where she did her best with inadequate equipment to attend to the health of any who might be ailing.

  A short distance from this were the cookhouse and the lean-to where their two “boys” slept. May had to laugh when Herbert referred to them as “the boys.” It always seemed to her so comical for in fact they were handsome young men in their twenties, brothers, and as broad shouldered and impressively muscled as gladiators.

  The one who did the cooking was married. Herbert had conducted the ceremony a few weeks after they had moved in, and had at the same time taken the opportunity of baptizing the three children, when he had baptized their parents. Their father had chosen the name of Zebedee, and after some argument Herbert had given in to this wish. He would himself have preferred to bestow upon him the name of one of the disciples or apostles but had unwillingly allowed that Zebedee was perhaps near enough.

  Zebedee’s brother, not to be outdone, had requested Boanerges, and this demand, although their relationship was scripturally wrong, had also been granted. Zebedee’s wife had been content to become Mary. Their Melanesian names had been quite unpronounceable, and so this solution had been simpler for all.

  May was uneasy that Zebedee insisted on sleeping in the lean-to rather than in his own hut on the shore of the lagoon. Marriage was sacred, and surely his proper place was at his wife’s side? She had resolved many times to speak to him about it, and had tried once to get Herbert to do so but he had been embarrassed by the idea. Zebedee would want to know why, and they neither of them had any desire to embark upon so delicate a topic.

  It had been a matter of nagging distress to May and Herbert that they were such very poor linguists. Maybe, Herbert thought, if he had possessed a better ear for languages he might have advanced further in his vocation. It had been a tremendous handicap and one that probably had held him back. May, however, in an attempt to remedy this weakness had trained herself to become an excellent, if unorthodox, teacher of English. She was blessed with patience and humor and had a talent for pantomime which had stood them in good stead. Nor had their frequent transfers been helpful. Sierra Leone, Uganda, Kweichow, Kansu and finally Namavava had made it difficult for them to become completely identified with their surroundings, since they had never had the opportunity of putting down roots, not strong tap roots, which were so essential in their life.

  They hoped that they would be permitted to stay on Namavava for many years. After all, May told herself, it was Herbert who had started the mission. It was his creation, and she considered and also prayed, that they would be allowed to remain there until the time should come for their retirement. The islanders were so charming and lovable, as naive as children, of course, but friendly and biddable children, and from a total of the two thousand scattered population they could already lay claim to at least a quarter of that number as converts.

  Wisely, Herbert had not, upon their arrival, insisted on the destruction or disfigurement of the idols which they had found. Rather had he sought to wean away their worshippers by treating the images as interesting antiquities whose interest could be compared to those on Easter Island. He had taken immense pains to put over this viewpoint.

  They had encountered no trouble. There had been no unpleasant incidents, that is to say, there had been none until a month before. Then, unhappily, there had been a murder, a crime which was unheard of on the island.

  When they had been informed of it they had hoped, at the beginning, that it could have been treated as a case of assault but, as a result of the injuries which had been inflicted, the victim had later died. It was, or so Herbert had been told, the sole case of its kind to have happened on Namavava within living memory.

  Mahele, who was one of the innumerable nephews of the Chief, had enticed a girl into a cave which was in the Bay of Shells, and there he had raped her. She had been betrothed to Ke-Kulah, who was related to Zebedee. Through the ages rape on Namavava had been taboo, especially where a betrothed girl had been involved. The girl had immediately confessed to her father what had occurred and Ke-Kulah with the assistance of her brother Manè had waylaid Mahele, and after beating him almost senseless had clumsily castrated him and had then left him for dead in the cave where his offense had been committed. It was fortunate, May thought, that none of those concerned was as yet a Christian.

  Mahele had been found on the following morning and carried back by members of his family to the missionary’s house and May had done her utmost to save his life. It had been the day that the schooner from Misima had been due for its monthly call with the Wessels’ mail and supplies.

  Herbert had not made an official report to the schooner’s Captain, and in failing to do so he might have been wrong, but he had hoped that Mahele would recover and had wanted to postpone any action for as long as it could be arranged, and to avoid, if it were possible, the necessity of the men having to face a capital charge. But soon after the schooner had sailed, when the victim had died, Herbert had had a case of murder or, at the best, of manslaughter, on his hands.

  Accordingly, since there would be no communication with the outside world for a further four weeks, and as the island possessed neither a gaol nor a police force, Herbert had put Mahele’s assailants under arrest in a hut which he had ordered to be converted into a makeshift prison, and had appointed a roster of guards to ensure that they did not escape. Both May and he made a routine visit twice daily to the prisoners in order to satisfy themselves that they were b
eing well treated until the date when they could be sent to Misima to stand their trial.

  He was most upset by this outbreak of violence, and his anguish was made the more acute as he was unable, to any appreciable extent, to communicate with or to comfort the accused men, and their bewilderment at having been apprehended for doing only what they had conceived as being their duty was another cross for him to bear, since he could not explain to them the error of their thinking.

  Herbert’s depression was in no way shared by the islanders, to whom the affair was fraught with drama and excitement. As capital punishment at the hands of white men had been hitherto unknown, the prisoners came to be regarded as sacrificial animals who would be called upon to expiate their misdeeds for the sake of the community, and once they had been enclosed behind bars they enjoyed that odd veneration accorded to the doomed, being regarded, to all intents and purposes, as already convicted and waiting for the hangman’s noose.

  This aspect of the situation Zebedee and Boanerges endeavored to put forward to Herbert, and they were at a loss to comprehend why he should continue to be so cast down and to worry himself about their fate. It had been an exciting event, a welcome break in the monotony of their uneventful lives. The target of their criticism had been shifted from Mahele to Manè and Ke-Kulah for their bungling in not having finished off the culprit cleanly and throwing his body to the sharks, a course which would have avoided all the fuss and interference from outside authorities as well as obeying their ancient and unwritten laws.

  The two houseboys, in common with Herbert’s regular congregation, were devoted to their employers and were proud of the cachet which their positions in God’s House endowed them, for the missionary’s home ranked equally in their minds with the precincts of the church. So far as it lay in their power they were determined to help him in his tilling of the Lord’s vineyard, and none were more active in canvassing and gaining new proselytes although, it must be admitted, conversion was looked upon more in the nature of being allowed into a select Club than of embracing an uplifting creed.

  They had done their best to increase and widen the Wessels’ grasp of their dialect and so improve their potentialities for free expression, but it had been uphill and unrewarding work and they had begun to despair of success.

  The day before that of the schooner’s expected return fell on a Friday, and Herbert was seated on the cooler side of the verandah wrestling with the weekly problem of Sunday’s sermon, which had to be elementary, basic, and intelligible. He had given them The Ten Commandments repeatedly and in varying homely guises, and was planning to discourse once more on Thou Shalt Do No Murder, both to point Manè’s and Ke-Kulah’s crime and to try to make his listeners understand the justice of retribution. He gazed thoughtfully at a lizard plastered motionless on a newel post near to his elbow. The task which he was setting himself was a sad and a difficult one.

  By reason of their mutually limited vocabularies his flock’s perception was confined to bare essentials, and the stirring events in the Old and New Testaments had to be recounted as one would tell them to infants in a kindergarten. The Flood, The Tower of Babel, The Fall of Jericho and above all the life of Jesus Christ had come to sound in his own ears like far away fairy stories, while confusion was apt to take place over such differing injunctions in the Holy Book as demanding an eye for an eye and, alternatively, meekly turning the other cheek.

  Herbert put down his pencil and decided that he would go and see Ke-Kulah and Manè once more after he had revised his sermon, and that Zebedee should go with him to act as his interpreter. It would be in the nature of a farewell for he might not be seeing them alone again. The men seemed to have no idea of their predicament or of the prolonged proceedings which were awaiting them, and their families had cast them off in new found horror when they had realized that Captain Marriott’s schooner and the important island of Misima were to be involved. It would be a public scandal and would bring shame upon them all.

  Herbert’s visit was not a success, and despite the blood bond between Zebedee and one of the accused, it rapidly deteriorated into a slanging match, for the houseboy resented bitterly the discredit which had been brought down on them all and which had reflected not only upon Namavava but on The Reverence as well.

  The evening was sultry and suffocating and the sky was obscured by a mass of leaden clouds. The rainy season was due to start, but Herbert thought there would be several days of this breathless and unbearable heat before the weather finally broke.

  He was writing in his diary when May emerged from her dispensary to summon him to the evening meal. Each night he confided to the pages in his neat hand exactly where he considered that he had failed in his calling, often when he had been needed most. Tonight he had written that he should have been more resolute in the guidance of his people by setting them a more combative example in the Christian cause. If he had done so, the murder of Mahele, and even the rape of the girl, might never have occurred. He blamed himself for having been too lax.

  There was no breath of wind to stir the oppressive humid air, but the table had been laid as usual on the eastern side of the verandah. Apart from her modest store of tinned foods, which May doled out herself with strict economy, she left the housekeeping to Zebedee. Their menu was supplied from such bounty as the island could provide, eggs, scrawny chickens, goat meat, and fish and fruit in abundance.

  Tonight Zebedee had given them a clam soup followed by a stew of tongue with which he had served sweet potatoes. A basket of multi-colored fruit, arranged by an artist’s hand, stood upon the little wicker side table.

  Herbert did not say a great deal during dinner, and May told him of her own afternoon’s activities. Three more of the women had come to her and had asked if they could have cotton dresses, which was a minor triumph, for they preferred to leave their breasts bare. She had lanced the festering finger of a small boy. She had written a long letter to her sister Hilda in Essex, where she was married to a farmer and was the mother of four sons. May would have liked to live near her when they returned to England. She often discussed this possibility with Herbert. She wondered why the Lord had denied issue to themselves. No doubt He had His own reasons for having done so but it had been a great disappointment. May said that she hoped that Captain Marriott would bring sorely wanted medical supplies. There was hardly a drop of iodine left and her stock of aspirin and bandages was dangerously low. Besides which, they were nearly out of tea.

  At the end of the meal Herbert returned to his task of recording the day’s doings and to smoke the second of the ration of three pipes which he allowed himself. Before he went to bed he would try again to communicate with Ke-Kulah and Manè and this time he would ask his wife to accompany him.

  May left him to his labors and went over to the cookhouse. Really Zebedee and Boanerges had excelled themselves. The soup had been delicious and the tongue had been more like that of a calf than of a goat. He must have simmered it for hours to make it so tender. He was a born cook and one to whom she had at once admitted that she could teach nothing. She gave grateful thanks to her Maker for having allowed them such a luxury.

  “The boys” were together, talking in low voices and squatting upon their heels on the ground. Boanerges had stripped off the loose coat which he had worn while serving them and they were both of them clad only in abbreviated loincloths, one of scarlet, the other of patterned green and blue, that left their magnificent torsos and well developed limbs exposed. They leapt to their feet at May’s approach.

  They were delighted by her appreciation, towering over her and grinning with pleasure. “It was good, Missah?” said Zebedee eagerly. “Good, eh? But no goat, Missah. No goat.” He clapped his brother on the back. “See, Boanerges, the Missah liked! The Reverence too? Now we shall see, Missah! Now The Reverence happy he will speak Namavan like native man. They will all see. Is not that so, Boanerges?” He swung round t
o his brother for confirmation. “Now everyone will understand what he is trying to tell us.”

  “Yes, Missah,” Boanerges said. “As The Reverence gentleman told us in the church in the words of the Mighty Saint Paul,” he frowned in an effort of memory. “‘With other men’s tongues and through my lips will I speak unto this peoples.’” He quoted the text with great pride. “My peoples, they shall all hear,” he said. “On Sunday they shall all hear.”

  May was puzzled. Surely it was Corinthians 13. “Tongues of men and of angels.” No, that was not right. Boanerges had been correct. What had the text actually been? “With men of other tongues and other lips will I speak unto this people.” Still, Boanerges had made a gallant effort and she beamed her approval at him.

  “God will speak to you in His own way,” she said.

  “Yes, Missah,” replied Boanerges. “God will now be able to speak to us. It will be made easy for The Reverence.”

  Zebedee was smiling, showing his magnificent teeth. They had held a meeting last night down in the village and they had all been in agreement. “Those no good men down there won’t need them no more, Missah,” he assured her. “And they can now take their part in the spreading of the Gospel to the whole of our peoples. Even to those savages from Bwago and Zagu.” These were two remote villages on the island’s northern tip. “Even they will understand,” he said scornfully. “Will they not, Boanerges?”

  “Praise the Lord they will,” said his brother, “now that The Reverence has had the gift of tongues!”

  An icy fear struck at May. “What do you mean, Zebedee,” she said. “What do you mean? What is it that you have done?”

  The young giant grinned down at her. “We ain’t done nothing wrong, Missah. Just turned those lazy wicked-bad murderers into good Christians. They going to die by execution when they go Misima, so why should they not help The Reverence and Missah before they are taken away?” He spoke reasonably as if May were being rather dense.