Hawaii - James Michener [30]
"I am Tehani, Chief Tatai's daughter."
"Tehani," Teroro interpreted. "The little darling."
The girl laughed nervously and replied, "My mother was beautiful." With a swift passage of his arm about her hair-hidden waist, Teroro swept Tehani into the air and carried her into her house. Happily, she twisted her long tresses about his face and pressed her lips to his. When he had placed her on the soft pandanus mats she pulled away her skirt of ti leaves and said, "It was my mother who warned me not to tear the skirt." And she pulled Teroro onto her and wrapped her arms about him, twisted and sought him, pressing him ever more strongly to her. But later, as he lay in the starlight that drifted in through the doorway, he swore to himself: "I will destroy this compound . . . this whole island."
But in the morning, after he had eaten in the men's house, where his adventure with Tehani occasioned no comment, he returned to the girl's secluded house, and after a while the two lovers began idly toying with the famous Havaiki slapping game, wherein to an ancient chant each gently tapped the other's finger tips, then shoulders, then sides, then thighs; as the game progressed the slaps grew in intensity, until perversely they dropped away to the tenderest of caresses, so that a gesture which started as a quick slap might end as a long embrace. At last Tehani lingered so gently over one slap, that Teroro caught her skirt and pulled it from her. Completely naked, she continued the game, chanting a few haphazard bars and attempting a few more desultory slaps, now grown breathless and passionate, until with a cry of soft triumph she surrendered the game and rolled into Teroro's arms, pushing him back onto the matting.
Later she whispered, "This is the way we fight on Havaiki." When Teroro laughed she asked, "Can girls of Bora Bora fight with their men like this?" Teroro was not pleased with the question, and although Tehani sensed his irritation she nevertheless pursued: "Is it true that on tiny Bora Bora you still pray to Tane?" The manner in which she pronounced tiny and Tane betrayed the contempt with which people of her island had always regarded Bora Bora.
Teroro did not rise to the insult. With studied courtesy he said, "We pray to Oro, which is why, even though we are so small, we invariably defeat Havaiki in war."
Tehani blushed at the memory of her island's humiliations and asked, "Did you wonder why my father came for you last night? And why I danced for you?"
"I thought about it. It looked planned."
"And why I brought you here?"
"At first love-making a man sometimes wonders," Teroro said. "At the second he no longer bothers."
"And at the third," Tehani whispered, "he decides to stay with this girl ... to make his home here ... to become a man of Havaiki."
Teroro pulled away and said, "For a warrior there is only one home, Bora Bora."
It was an ancient island custom that high-born women could seek their husbands, and Tehani now did so. "I plead with you, Teroro. Stay here with me."
"If you want to be my wife," he said, "you'll have to come to my island."
"You already have a first wife there, Teroro. Live here, and I will be your first wife."
The young chief held the girl off and studied her marvelous face.
"Why do you ask this, Tehani? You could have any man on Havaiki."
The girl hesitated, then decided to speak the truth. "Your island is doomed, Teroro. You must escape. Come here. Be loyal to Oro. We can have a good life." "Has your father suggested this?"
"Yes."
"What evil is he planning?"
"I dare not say," she answered. Taking Teroro's hands, she knelt before him and pleaded softly, "I have shown you how sweet Havaiki could be because I want to save