Tales of the South Pacific - James A. Michener [132]
"Interesting man, Billis," the chaplain said wanly. "He took me into the jungle a few weeks ago to see a ceremonial. We may see one today. They're unbelievable. A family raises a pig for nine or ten years. It has value only in the fraction of a minute when you stand over it with the sacred club, ready to kill it. Then everybody says, 'Look at the wonderful pig he is going to kill! He must be a very fine man to kill such a pig!' After the pig is dead and the meat given to friends they say, 'The owner of this pig is a wonderful man. Look at all the meat he gave away to his friends.'" The chaplain laughed as he acted out the speeches. It was like being in a pulpit again. Somewhat shaky, but a pulpit all the same.
"Billis tells me we are going to see a truly sacred pig today," he continued. "One whose tusks have made two complete circles! They have burrowed twice through the pig's face and once through the jawbone. I understand men from other villages come from miles about just to see the holy tusker. The chief is going to kill the pig soon. He must. For if that pig were to die, or if it were to break one of its tusks, he would be a scorned man. Everyone would say, 'He was unwilling to give the holy pig away. Now see! It is nothing. It did him no good! A man with only a little pig is better than the chieftain. For the man with the little pig can give it away!' That's exactly what they'd say."
The crash boat rolled and turned. Fry was making bets with himself that the chaplain would heave before the lee of Vanicoro was reached. But the game little fellow stuck it out. "You're lookin' better Chappy!" irreverent Billis called down from the bridge.
"I feel better!" the chaplain said. The boat was heading for the bay of Bali-ha'i, a tiny island with rocky cliffs facing the sea. "Looks good to see land again," he said.
As soon as the boat was anchored off the white sands of Bali-ha'i, Billis was fighting a rubber dory over the side, giving the coxswain all sorts of help and trouble. Fry, Benoway, and the chaplain climbed in. Billis shoved off and rowed energetically toward Vanicoro across the channel. As soon as the bumpy little boat hit land, Billis took charge of the expedition.
A group of small boys had gathered to greet the Americans. Billis talked with them briefly and selected a lad of ten to lead him to the high country near the volcanoes. Billis and the boy walked in front, followed by Fry. The chaplain and Benoway brought up the rear.
The party traveled through dense jungle, across small streams and up steep hillsides. At the end of the first mile everyone was sweating freely. The little chaplain dripped perspiration from his thumbs. Fry grunted and swore as the stuff ran off his eyebrows. Billis, surprisingly enough, seemed never to tire. Once he passed a native and his Mary. "Hiya, Joe! Whaddaya know?" he called out in breezy fashion.
The grinning native had been across the sea to Espiritu. He called back, "Good duty, boss!"
"So long, Joe!"
A little while later a chief and his three Maries came along the narrow trail. Billis stopped and talked with them briefly in Beche-le-Mer. Then he grinned at the officers. "He says there's a pig killing, all right. Up in the hills."
The narrow trails now became mere threads through the immense jungle. It was difficult to believe that these frail communications had served men and women for more than five hundred years. And they were still the only trails between the hill villages and the sea.
At last the men came to a native village. It was a sight new and strange to Benoway. It was not at all what he had been led to expect. Only by grace of custom could it be called a village. It was more correctly a homestead. Only one family lived there, and they were absent on a visit. Off to a sing-sing somewhere deeper in the jungle. Or maybe to the pig killing higher up the mountainside.