Tales of the South Pacific (46 page)

"Then ask Tony to get the parachutes."

"I can't, Bus! I want to surprise Tony." She ran her fingers down my shirt sleeve. And I knew I was in the parachute business.

Lt. Col. Haricot and Laurencin were married in the salon. An island missionary, a Baptist, officiated. Tony Fry was best man. I gave the bride away. As always, I had tears in my eyes. I'm a sucker for a wedding. Latouche, in a simple white store dress, stood inconspicuously with her sister.

But at the reception Latouche appeared in the doorway dressed in shimmering parachute silk. We all gasped! Not even if I was drunk could I imagine a girl so beautiful. She had taken my three old 'chutes and cut them into many pointed strips. Do you know parachute silk? Soft as a baby's breath. Well she had made herself a sweeping gown that measured more than twenty-five yards around the hem. Yet the silk was so delicate that it came to a thin band about her tiny waist. She wore a bodice that seemed nothing at all. Up here she was framed in silk, and we didn't look at much but Latouche that night. Strange, but the clashing red and yellow colors blended delicately against her golden skin.

"You were mine, once, baby," I whispered to myself.

As she passed me in the salon she pressed my hand and said in a hushed voice, "Meet me by the shed. Please." My heart thumped as I hastened down a dark path which led to the little huts in which the Javanese workmen lived. Latouche was waiting for me in the shadows. To my dismay, Tony was with her. "A surprise!" she said.

There, ahead of us, in a hollow square formed by two huts, the shed, and a bamboo screen, the local Buddhists had set up a temple. They were holding sacred ceremonials to honor the marriage of Marthe De Becque and her American sergeant.

In the darkness two teak logs had been placed upright about twenty feet apart. Between them were nailed three wide teak planks, one above the other, to form an altar. White cloths were placed over each plank. Candles flickered on the topmost cloth. Four bronze objects, like plates, glistened on the lower planks.

On a finely woven mat in front of the altar an old Buddhist priest, in white pants and black silk coat, knelt and prayed. On either side of him, sitting cross-legged, were two other Javanese, also in black. One hammered a small drum in irregular rhythms. The other tapped a tinkling bell at intervals. In time the drum and the bell filled our minds and seemed to echo all about us.

We sat upon the ground. In ghastly and uncertain light from flickering candles Marthe and the sergeant stood before the priest. Women from the plantation, Javanese prostitutes from the two houses, and old men from the cacao bins moaned in the night. The drum and bell beat on.

The priest rose and blessed the couple before him. Upon Marthe he placed the special blessing of fertility, a kind of priestly second-guessing. An old Javanese next to Tony explained the meaning of the rites. Fry, who was learning the language, replied sagely.

The drum beat on. The tinkling bell haunted my ears when I became aware of a disturbance behind me. Suddenly there was shouting in Javanese and then bold words in French.

"Mon Dieu!" Latouche cried and became pale.

"This is it!" Fry whispered, licking his thin lips.

Into the holy place strode a gaunt Frenchman. Achille Barzan was down from the hills. "Idolaters!" he shouted. "Thieves! Adulterers!" He rushed toward the altar and knocked it over. Then seeing Latouche in her brilliant dress he lunged at her. I interceded. Barzan struck me with a heavy club. I stumbled backward. I thought my arm was broken.

Seeing this, Latouche screamed and rushed from the enclosure. Her flowing gown caught in the bamboo screen and pulled it down. Her flying skirt flashing in the candlelight, she rushed up the hill toward the safety of her white house. Although my arm was aching, I tried to stop Barzan. I made a football dive for him but bumped into Tony Fry instead. If I had been quicker on my feet, I might have stopped a tragedy.

For Latouche did not reach her room in time to lock the door. In a wild burst of fury Achille Barzan pushed his way into the white house. Swinging his club over his head, he lunged at his wife. There were four pistol shots. Barzan, stumbling backward, clutched twice at the stars, and fell dead.

In the long questioning that ensued Lt. Col. Haricot was superb. The French interrogators liked him. He had a French name and could speak their language badly enough to win both their respect and pity. He was also a moral man, a man of sentiment.

He insisted that Latouche had acted in self-defense. That she was a proper and well brought up girl. That Achille Barzan was a bully and a tyrant. That Achille was a dirty dog and a Pétainist as well. "Nothing to do with the case!" the commissioner said.

"It shows he was without honor!" Haricot insisted. The colonel spoke for both Tony and me. We were not allowed to testify, for example, that we even knew where her room was. I was not asked if I had heard her threaten to kill two different persons. Nor did I speak about her wish that her husband was dead. No, we were model witnesses.

"Had Tony Fry been a frequent visitor at the plantation?" He had. "Was he, what you might call..." Oh, no, he was not! "Had he ever, what you might say..." Never! "Then, colonel, what was he doing at the plantation?" The colonel blustered and asked Fry what he was doing there. "Learning to speak Javanese."

"Could the lieutenant speak a little Javanese?" He could and he would. "What did the lieutenant say, interpreter?" He said, "Copra will stay high it the United States keeps on buying."

At this point Colonel Haricot pointed out four facts. "Had Achille Barzan threatened his wife?" He had. "Had he tried to break the American pilot's arm?" He had. "Had he raised a club to strike his wife?" Nine witnesses saw that. "Had she shot him in self-defense?" Obviously.

Bien! What can one say? Especially when this fellow Haricot keeps talking all the time? Well, commissioner? Well... Yes... Of course, Madame Barzan must be arrested, yes. A mere formality. Colonel Haricot's testimony has already taken care of that.

When news of the tragedy reached old Papa Barzan in prison he went wild with sorrow and cursed Latouche far into the night. He screamed that his son had met her in Pink House in Noumea. That she was an evil devil. But the old fellow was deranged. That's clear from what happened a few days later when he heard that Latouche had been released. The old man backed up and dashed himself against the wall four times until he broke his neck.

Of course, Colonel Haricot had to leave Luana Pori. He had, in a sense, disgraced the Army. Marrying a half-caste. Mixed up in a murder. He kissed Laurencin lovingly before he left, and prayed to God that he left in her womb a daughter as lovely as she.

Josephine's sailor came up here to Konora. He helped to make our beachhead against the Japs. One night he almost went mad, for he saw among the coconut trees torn and blasted by the shell fire, one that bent toward him like the slim Javanese girl on Luana Pori. They gave him permission later to fly back and marry her.

Marthe's sergeant was not so lucky. He stopped a bullet in the surf right out there where you're looking. A friend who had raised hell when the sergeant married Marthe saw him bouncing face-down on the coral and thought, "Maybe he wasn't so dumb."

My own life was disrupted when the colonel left. That same day Lisette received a cablegram from Rome. Her husband had been rescued from a prison camp. He was with the Americans in Rome. An old man brought the cable, and Lisette started to cry. I paid the old man and sent him away.

"He'll get through all right, now. I know!" Lisette whimpered in French. "Dear God, I prayed so hard for him." Tears flooded her eyes and she could say nothing. She patted my arm. She wiped her face. She took my handkerchief and blew her nose. "I got to leave, Bus. I gonna be a good wife now," she said.

Of the lovers at the plantation only Latouche and Tony remained Like children lost in a dream of Christmas they wandered about the gardens and the beaches. I came upon them one day, far below on the white coral. Latouche wore nothing, simply that golden body slim and twisting in the shallow water. It was then that I, too, left the plantation and started to pack. I knew we were moving north to Kuralei.

I had done little more than get the jeeps and bulldozers ready for the ship when Tony came to see me. "You in trouble?" I asked when I saw his grave face.

"Holy cow, no!" he replied, breaking into a fine smile. "Bus, I want you to be my best man."

I took a deep breath. Looked at the shadows under the palm trees. Then at Tony. He was dressed in dirty slacks, sneakers, and a sun helmet. He looked like a beachcomber, a very special beachcomber. "Latouche?" I asked.

"Yes."

"But, Tony! They won't grant you permission. Not after what happened."

"I'm not asking for any permission."

"What are you going to do?"

"The Buddhist priest. Saturday night. Nobody needs to know a thing."

"But the Navy..."

"Nobody needs to know."

My head was a bit dizzy. God knows I knew what a man felt out there on that plantation. The long days, the ocean, the jungle creeping up on you. And that little white house. The laughter of living girls. But marriage? An old fool like Haricot from Terre Haute, or a sailor from Boston, maybe. But Tony Fry...

"Listen, Tony," I pleaded. "You got hot pants. So have I. So has everybody else. But you don't have to marry the girl!"

"Bus," Tony said softly. "If you weren't my best friend and you said that. Well, I'd bust you one in the mouth." Smiling, he suddenly whipped his right fist up from his knees. But remembering my tender jaw, he pulled his punch and hit me beside the head. We stumbled into a chair.

"You got it bad, Tony," I mumbled.

"I want you for my best man. I'm getting married."

"It won't stand up in court," I said, rubbing my head. "You're just kidding yourself and the girl."

"Now look, Bus," Tony said very quietly. "I know what I want. I'm a big boy. See? All my life I've seen guys looking for the girl they wanted. Hungry guys, growing old. Empty inside. Bus, this girl's for me. She fills me up. To overflowing. This is it."

"If you try to take her back to the States, Tony! Everyone will think she's a Jap."

"I won't," he replied. "And maybe I won't go back to the States. I like this life. The hot afternoons and cool nights. I like these islands. I've got some cash. Maybe life here is what I've been looking for. This Pacific will be the center of the new world. This is our future. Well, I'm part of it. This is for me."

"Tony, you're forcing me," I said. "What do you know about the Pink House in Noumea?"

"You tell me, Bus. What do you think? Honestly?"

"You asked for it, Tony. Here it is. You don't know Latouche. That Achille Barzan deal! Do you know she dreamed of his death? That she prayed for it? The girl's little better than a murderess! I'm sorry, Fry, but there it is."

Tony rubbed his nose to hide the fact that he was laughing. "Bus," he chuckled. "You're a lovely guy. That Achille Barzan deal, as you call it. What would you say if I told you that Latouche and I planned every step. For days and days. Natives reported each morning where Barzan was hiding. We paid them to let Barzan overhear that Marthe was being married. When and where. We knew he was coming. We considered six different ways of doing him in. I wanted to shoot him myself. Take a general court. Self-defense. Latouche could join me later. But she figured a better way. She knew he hated her because she went on being a Buddhist. Same time she was a Catholic. We knew Barzan would try to break up the wedding."

"So it was all an act?"

"No, it was real. Your arm was almost broken, wasn't it? He tried to kill her with a club, didn't he? Just as we planned it."

I laughed at myself. "And I was running like a fool to try to save her! >From Achille! Boy, oh boy!"

Tony grinned at me, in that silly old way of his. "We figured on that, too, Bus. We knew you were sentimental. That you liked to protect women. We knew you would try to catch Achille before he reached the door. Why do you suppose I bumped you when you started to chase him? Did you think you stumbled?"

We looked at one another across the dusty jeeps and bulldozers there along the shore. Tony dragged out some papers. "How about signing them for me, Bus?" I leafed through them. Statements to his bank that Latouche De Becque Barzan Fry was his lawful wife. A will. A letter to his insurance agent. The usual stuff. I witnessed them for him, sealed them in an envelope, and censored it.

That Saturday night the moon was full. You know how it rises out of the jungle on such nights. First a glow, then the trees burst into flame, and finally the tallest ones stand like charred stumps against the moon itself. In the moonlight, with the drum beating and the little bell ringing, Tony married the girl.

I kissed the bride and hurried back to the fighter strip. I couldn't think. To hell with dinners and Luana Pori and crazy men like Tony Fry and women like Latouche. I was sort of tied up inside. You fellows know what to do in a case like that. Even though it was against orders I revved up a plane and took off. Into the darkness. But when I was over the jungle and out across the ocean, the moon made everything bright and wonderful. I flew back very high. Below me was the plantation. Just a sliver chopped out of the dark jungle. I could see the salon, the little house Lisette and I had, Latouche's sleeping house, the white fence. I dived and buzzed the place until my ears rang. I'd give them a wedding present! You know what a plane does for you at a time like that. You can climb and twist. It's like playing God. And when you come down, you can sleep.

On Sunday the ship came to take us north. I hurried out to the plantation to get Fry. I found him sitting on a bench among the flowers. Latouche in a skimpy brassiere and shorts lay with her head in his lap. He was reading Chinese Lea to her.

"This book says the future of America is with Asia," Latouche said in French.

"You know, Bus?" Tony began. "This guy is right. You wait. We'll all be out here again. We'll be fighting China or India or Malaysia. Asia's never going to let Australia stay white. Bus, if you're smart, you'll move out here somewhere. This is the crossroads of the world from now on."