The Great Taboo

CHAPTER XV.

THE SE­CRET OF KO­RONG.

“You have lived here long?” Fe­lix asked, with tremu­lous in­ter­est, as he took a seat on the bench un­der the big tree, to­ward which his new host po­lite­ly mo­tioned him. “You know the peo­ple well, and all their su­per­sti­tions?”

“_Helas_, yes, mon­sieur,” the French­man an­swered, with a sigh of re­gret. “Eigh­teen years have I spent al­to­geth­er in this beast of a Pa­cif­ic; nine as a con­vict in New Cale­do­nia, and nine more as a god here; and, be­lieve me, I hard­ly know which is the hard­er post. Yours is the first White face I have ev­er seen since my ar­rival in this cursed is­land.”

“And how did you come here?” Fe­lix asked, half breath­less, for the very mag­ni­tude of the stake at is­sue--no less a stake than Muriel's life--made him hes­itate to put point-​blank the ques­tion he had most at heart for the mo­ment.

“Mon­sieur,” the French­man an­swered, try­ing to cov­er his rags with his na­tive cape, “that ex­plains it­self eas­ily. I was a med­ical stu­dent in Paris in the days of the Com­mune. Ah! that beloved Paris--how far away it seems now from Boupari! Like all oth­er stu­dents I was ad­vanced--Re­pub­li­can, So­cial­ist--what you will--a po­lit­ical en­thu­si­ast. When the events took place--the events of '70--I es­poused with all my heart the cause of the peo­ple. You know the rest. The bour­geoisie con­quered. I was tak­en red-​hand­ed, as the Ver­sail­lais said--my pis­tol in my grasp--an open rev­olu­tion­ist. They tried me by court-​mar­tial--br'r'r--no de­lay--guilty, M. le Pres­ident--hard la­bor to per­pe­tu­ity. They sent me with that brave Louise Michel and so many oth­er good com­rades of the cause to New Cale­do­nia. There, nine years of con­vict life was more than enough for me. One day I found a ca­noe on the shore--a lit­tle Kana­ka ca­noe--you know the type--a mere shape­less dug-​out. Hasti­ly I load­ed it with food--yam, taro, bread-​fruit--I pushed it off in­to the sea--I em­barked alone--I in­trust­ed my­self and all my for­tunes to the Bon Dieu and the wide Pa­cif­ic. The Bon Dieu did not whol­ly jus­ti­fy my con­fi­dence. It is a way he has--that in­scrutable one. Six weeks I float­ed hith­er and thith­er be­fore vary­ing winds. At last one evening I reached this is­land. I float­ed ashore. And, _en­fin, me voila_!”

“Then you were a po­lit­ical pris­on­er on­ly?” Fe­lix said, po­lite­ly.

M. Jules Pey­ron drew him­self up with much dig­ni­ty in his tat­tered cos­tume. “Do I look like a card-​sharp­er, mon­sieur?” he asked sim­ply, with of­fend­ed hon­or.

Fe­lix has­tened to re­as­sure him of his per­fect con­fi­dence. “On the con­trary, mon­sieur,” he said, “the mo­ment I heard you were a con­vict from New Cale­do­nia, I felt cer­tain in my heart you could be noth­ing less than one of those un­for­tu­nate and ill-​treat­ed Com­mu­nards.”

“Mon­sieur,” the French­man said, seiz­ing his hand a sec­ond time, “I per­ceive that I have to do with a man of hon­or and a man of feel­ing. Well, I land­ed on this is­land, and they made me a god. From that day to this I have been anx­ious on­ly to shuf­fle off my un­wel­come di­vin­ity, and re­turn as a mere man to the shores of Eu­rope. Bet­ter be a valet in Paris, say I, than a de­ity of the best in Poly­ne­sia. It is a monotonous ex­is­tence here--no so­ci­ety, no life--and the _cui­sine_--bah, ex­ecrable! But till the oth­er day, when your steam­er passed, I have scarce­ly even sight­ed a Eu­ro­pean ship. A boat came here once, worse luck, to put off two girls (who didn't be­long to Boupari), re­turned in­den­tured la­bor­ers from Queens­land; but, un­hap­pi­ly, it was dur­ing my taboo--the Month of Birds, as my jail­ers call it--and though I tried to go down to it or to make sig­nals of dis­tress, the na­tives stood round my hut with their spears in line, and pre­vent­ed me by main force from sig­nalling to them or com­mu­ni­cat­ing with them. Even the oth­er day, I nev­er heard of your ar­rival till a fort­night had elapsed, for I had been sick with fever, the fever of the coun­try, and as soon as my Shad­ow told me of your ad­vent it was my taboo again, and I was obliged to de­fer for my­self the hon­or of call­ing up­on my new ac­quain­tances. I am a god, of course, and can do what I like; but while my taboo is on, _ma foi_, mon­sieur, I can hard­ly call my life my own, I as­sure you.”

“But your taboo is up to-​day,” Fe­lix said, “so my Shad­ow tells me.”

“Your Shad­ow is a well-​in­formed young man,” M. Pey­ron an­swered, with easy French spright­li­ness. “As for my don­key of a valet, he nev­er by any chance knows or tells me any­thing. I had just sent him out--the pig--to learn, if pos­si­ble, your na­tion­al­ity and name, and what hours you pre­ferred, as I pro­posed lat­er in the day to pay my re­spects to made­moi­selle, your friend, if she would deign to re­ceive me.”

“Miss El­lis would be charmed, I'm sure,” Fe­lix replied, smil­ing in spite of him­self at so much Parisian court­li­ness un­der so ragged an ex­te­ri­or. “It is a great plea­sure to us to find we are not re­al­ly alone on this bar­barous is­land. But you were go­ing to ex­plain to me, I be­lieve, the ex­act na­ture of this per­il in which we both stand--the pre­cise dis­tinc­tion be­tween Ko­rong and Tu­la?”

“Alas, mon­sieur,” the French­man replied, draw­ing cir­cles in the dust with his stick with much dis­com­po­sure, “I can on­ly tell you I have been try­ing to make out the se­cret of this dis­tinc­tion my­self ev­er since the first day I came to the is­land; but so ret­icent are all the na­tives about it, and so deep is the taboo by which the mys­tery is guard­ed, that even now I, who am my­self Tu­la, can tell you but very lit­tle with cer­tain­ty on the sub­ject. All I can say for sure is this--that gods called Tu­la re­tain their god­ship in per­ma­nen­cy for a very long time, al­though at the end some vi­olent fate, which I do not clear­ly un­der­stand, is des­tined to be­fall them. That is my con­di­tion as King of the Birds--for no doubt they have told you that I, Jules Pey­ron--Re­pub­li­can, So­cial­ist, Com­mu­nist--have been el­evat­ed against my will to the hon­ors of roy­al­ty. That is my con­di­tion, and it mat­ters but lit­tle to me, for I know not when the end may come; and we can but die once; how or where, what mat­ters? Mean­while, I have my dis­trac­tions, my lit­tle _agre­ments_--my gar­dens, my mu­sic, my birds, my na­tive friends, my co­quetries, my aviary. As King of the Birds, I keep a small col­lec­tion of my sub­jects in the liv­ing form, not un­wor­thy of a sci­en­tif­ic eye. Mon­sieur is no or­nithol­ogist? Ah, no, I thought not. Well, for me, it mat­ters lit­tle; my time is long. But for you and Made­moi­selle, who are both Ko­rong--” He paused sig­nif­icant­ly.

“What hap­pens, then, to those who are Ko­rong?” Fe­lix asked, with a lump in his throat--not for him­self, but for Muriel.

The French­man looked at him with a doubt­ful look. “Mon­sieur,” he said, af­ter a pause, “I hard­ly know how to break the truth to you prop­er­ly. You are new to the is­land, and do not yet un­der­stand these sav­ages. It is so ter­ri­ble a fate. So dead­ly. So cer­tain. Com­pose your mind to hear the worst. And re­mem­ber that the worst is very ter­ri­ble.”

Fe­lix's blood froze with­in him; but he an­swered brave­ly all the same, “I think I have guessed it my­self al­ready. The Ko­rong are of­fered as hu­man sac­ri­fices to Tu-​Ki­la-​Ki­la.”

“That is near­ly so,” his new friend replied, with a solemn nod of his head. “Ev­ery Ko­rong is bound to die when his time comes. Your time will de­pend on the par­tic­ular date when you were ad­mit­ted to Heav­en.”

Fe­lix re­flect­ed a mo­ment. “It was on the 26th of last month,” he an­swered, short­ly.

“Very well,” M. Pey­ron replied, af­ter a brief cal­cu­la­tion. “You have just six months in all to live from that date. They will of­fer you up by Tu-​Ki­la-​Ki­la's hut the day the sun reach­es the sum­mer sol­stice.”

“But why did they make us gods then?” Fe­lix in­ter­posed, with tremu­lous lips. “Why treat us with such hon­ors mean­while, if they mean in the end to kill us?”

He re­ceived his sen­tence of death with greater calm­ness than the French­man had ex­pect­ed. “Mon­sieur,” the old­er ar­rival an­swered, with a re­flec­tive air, “there comes in the mys­tery. If we could solve that, we could find out al­so the way of es­cape for you. For there _is_ a way of es­cape for ev­ery Ko­rong: I know it well; I gath­er it from all the na­tives say; it is a part of their mys­ter­ies; but what it may be, I have hith­er­to, in spite of all my ef­forts, failed to dis­cov­er. All I _do_ know is this: Tu-​Ki­la-​Ki­la hates and dreads in his heart ev­ery Ko­rong that is el­evat­ed to Heav­en, and would do any­thing, if he dared, to get rid of him qui­et­ly. But he doesn't dare, be­cause he is bound hand and foot him­self, too, by taboos in­nu­mer­able. Taboo is the re­al god and king of Boupari. All the is­land alike bows down to it and wor­ships it.”

“Have you ev­er known Ko­rongs killed?” Fe­lix asked once more, trem­bling.

“Yes, mon­sieur. Many of them, alas! And this is what hap­pens. When the Ko­rong's time is come, as these crea­tures say, ei­ther on the sum­mer or win­ter sol­stice, he is bound with na­tive ropes, and car­ried up so pin­ioned to Tu-​Ki­la-​Ki­la's tem­ple. In the time be­fore this man was Tu-​Ki­la-​Ki­la, I re­mem­ber--”

“Stop,” Fe­lix cried. “I don't un­der­stand. Has there then been more than one Tu-​Ki­la-​Ki­la?”

“Why, yes,” the French­man an­swered. “Cer­tain­ly, many. And there the mys­tery comes in again. We have al­ways among us one Tu-​Ki­la-​Ki­la or an­oth­er. He is a sort of pope, or grand lama, _voyez-​vous?_ No soon­er is the last god dead than an­oth­er god suc­ceeds him and takes his name, or rather his ti­tle. This young man who now holds the place was known orig­inal­ly as Lavi­ta, the son of Sa­mi. But what is more cu­ri­ous still, the is­landers al­ways treat the new god as if he were pre­cise­ly the self-​same per­son as the old one. So far as I have been able to un­der­stand their the­ol­ogy, they be­lieve in a sort of trans­mi­gra­tion of souls. The soul of the Tu-​Ki­la-​Ki­la who is just dead pass­es in­to and an­imates the body of the Tu-​Ki­la-​Ki­la who suc­ceeds to the of­fice. Thus they speak as though Tu-​Ki­la-​Ki­la were a con­tin­uous ex­is­tence; and the god of the mo­ment, him­self, will even of­ten re­fer to events which oc­curred to him, as he says, a hun­dred years ago or more, but which he re­al­ly knows, of course, on­ly by the per­sis­tent tra­di­tion of the is­landers. They are a very cu­ri­ous peo­ple, these Bou­parese. But what would you have? Among sav­ages, one ex­pects things to be as among sav­ages.”

Fe­lix drew a qui­et sigh. It was cer­tain that on the is­land of Boupari that ex­pec­ta­tion, at least, was nev­er doomed to dis­ap­point­ment. “And when a Ko­rong is tak­en to Tu-​Ki­la-​Ki­la's tem­ple,” he asked, con­tin­uing the sub­ject of most im­me­di­ate in­ter­est, “what hap­pens next to him?”

“Mon­sieur,” the French­man an­swered, “I hard­ly know whether I do right or not to say the truth to you. Each Ko­rong is a god for one sea­son on­ly; when the year re­news it­self, as the sav­ages be­lieve, by a change of sea­son, then a new Ko­rong must be cho­sen by Heav­en to fill the place of the old ones who are to be sac­ri­ficed. This they do in or­der that the sea­sons may be ev­er fresh and vig­or­ous. Es­pe­cial­ly is that the case with the two me­te­oro­log­ical gods, so to speak, the King of the Rain and the Queen of the Clouds. Those, I un­der­stand, are the posts in their pan­theon which you and the la­dy who ac­com­pa­nies you oc­cu­py.”

“You are right,” Fe­lix an­swered, with pro­found­ly painful in­ter­est. “And what, then, be­comes of the king and queen who are sac­ri­ficed?”

“I will tell you,” M. Pey­ron an­swered, drop­ping his voice still low­er in­to a sym­pa­thet­ic key. “But steel your mind for the worst be­fore­hand. It is suf­fi­cient­ly ter­ri­ble. On the day of your ar­rival, this, I learn from my Shad­ow, is just what hap­pened. That night, Tu-​Ki­la-​Ki­la made his great feast, and of­fered up the two chief hu­man sac­ri­fices of the year, the free-​will of­fer­ing and the scape­goat of tres­pass. They keep then a fes­ti­val, which an­swers to our own New-​Year's day in Eu­rope. Next morn­ing, in ac­cor­dance with cus­tom, the King of the Rain and the Queen of the Clouds were to be pub­licly slain, in or­der that a new and more vig­or­ous king and queen should be cho­sen in their place, who might make the crops grow bet­ter and the sky more clement. In the midst of this hor­rid cer­emo­ny, you and made­moi­selle, by pure chance, ar­rived. You were im­me­di­ate­ly se­lect­ed by Tu-​Ki­la-​Ki­la, for some rea­son of his own, which I do not suf­fi­cient­ly un­der­stand, but which is, nev­er­the­less, ob­vi­ous to all the ini­ti­at­ed, as the next rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the rain-​giv­ing gods. You were pre­sent­ed to Heav­en on their lit­tle plat­form raised about the ground, and Heav­en ac­cept­ed you. Then you were en­vis­aged with the at­tributes of di­vin­ity; the care of the rain and the clouds was made over to you; and im­me­di­ate­ly af­ter, as soon as you were gone, the old king and queen were laid on an al­tar near Tu-​Ki­la-​Ki­la's home, and slain with tom­ahawks. Their flesh was next hacked from their bod­ies with knives, cooked, and eat­en; their bones were thrown in­to the sea, the moth­er of all wa­ters, as the na­tives call it. And that is the fate, I fear the in­evitable fate, that will be­fall you and made­moi­selle at these wretch­es' hands about the com­mence­ment of a fresh sea­son.”

Fe­lix knew the worst now, and bent his head in si­lence. His worst fears were con­firmed; but, af­ter all, even this knowl­edge was bet­ter than so much un­cer­tain­ty.

And now that he knew when “his time was up,” as the na­tives phrased it, he would know when to re­deem his promise to Muriel.