A Dolphins Dream (31 page)

Feeling particularly sharp this day, he took two good shots with the pole spear within the first hour and inexplicably missed the fish completely. In the next hour he attempted to stalk the relatively easy emperor fish but missed yet another opportunity. The sharpness felt earlier gave way to the sense that something was out of place in the water and while he could feel it on some dim level, he could not quite identify it. It was similar to being in a familiar room and having a piece of furniture moved just enough for the room to look the same but be different. There emerged an ominous feel to it and it was pervasive enough to send him to the outside so that he might catch the current back to the refuge of the beach. 

Diving to fifteen feet, he caught the full force of the current that propelled him like a petrel on a thermal lift. Flying as that selfsame bird and in the survey of the sea, he saw at the fringe of his visibility, in the brilliantly clear water, a shape materialize. It was a mammoth creature, a whale, running at the edge of the drop off, heading in his direction. In his elation he moved to intercept. It would a first encounter with a whale. It was either a bull pilot whale or perhaps a gray. In the moments that passed, as the creature came into clear view, he realized with crippling fear that it was not a whale at all but a shark, one of gigantic proportions. If it remained on its present course it would pass twenty feet beneath him and thirty feet to his right on the outside. It was greenish brown, the color of a tiger shark but too big to be a tiger shark, too wide, too long. Now he could see it clearly and judged its size to be twenty-five feet in length and five feet across the back with four-foot long pectoral fins jutting out on either side of its body. Its overall width was close to thirteen feet. Such statistics with the shark nearly upon him were insignificant, for they couldn’t begin to convey the awesome power and omnipotence of the beast. Compton was consumed with his imminent death and struck immobile in full body paralysis. The shark moved with effortless speed and with a will that obliterated every idea of shark that had ever been conjured in his most morbid fantasies. A dark, broken line near its tail was its only marking against the bile color of its skin. Its mouth was slightly ajar and exposed a set of primordial teeth that launched him into a pre-shock numbness that terminated all thought. The creature rolled slightly to its left for a better look at him and in its cold, black eye there was reflected the dull instinct to feed. Compton’s heart pounded like a jackhammer, signaling the terror, the surrender of a helpless prey. Though the pole spear was pointing in the direction of the shark it would have had no more effect that the prick of a pin on a charging rhinoceros.

The shark inexplicably peeled off toward the deep fringe and was out of sight in moments. Compton could not move. It required a supreme effort to get his legs to respond. Terrified to his core, he slid from reef to reef hugging their edges as a wounded animal might when adrift on the Serengeti, awaiting the return of its executioner. It was in this way that he was able to work his way into the beach. In that short swim he speculated what might have occurred had he been carrying a bleeding fish, which was usually the case. Thoughts of Sinaca and her alliance with the Sea God bloomed in his contorted imagination.

Compton was sitting on the beach in his dive gear when Moses came in the boat.

“I was working in the garden and got a terrible feeling,“ he said. “I came straight away.”

Compton told the story, describing the shark and its markings near the tail. “What kind of shark was it?”

Moses gazed out past the coral line where the shark had swum, blinked and licked his lips before slowly turning to Compton. “It was the Sea God.”

Compton smiled in acknowledgement of the observation. “Well, if ever there was a Sea God, that was it. But what’s the species?”

“It was a tiger,” said Moses, resuming his gaze on the water. “But everyone knows it is the Sea God. Very dangerous shark. Only one other man has seen the Sea God when he was in the water and lived and that was before I was born.”

Compton wiped his mouth with his forearm.

“You have no worries,” continued Moses. “If the shark did not eat you, that means you are safe from all sharks.”

Compton turned his attention to the water as if to see what Moses was fixed on and gave a slight shudder. “It moved so quickly, and it was so powerful. Like coming across a prehistoric beast that you thought was extinct. It could have taken me easily. I was helpless, absolutely, totally helpless.”

“if to seewill happen, Keli,” said Moses, studying the Tasman Strait as if something or someone was about to appear, “now that you have seen the Sea God?”   

“What do you mean, what will happen?”

“A Paramount Chief on Taveuni died in August. It was less than a hundred days ago. Seeing the Sea God is a sign to all islands. The shark is looking for a sacrifice to honor the dead chief. No one wants to sacrifice a villager from their island. It brings shame for a wrong doing. This shark has protected Qamea because nothing happened to you.”

“Moses, if I hadn’t seen that shark then none of this would have meaning. I think you’re attaching significance to something that… It wouldn’t have been a sacrifice, it would’ve been a shark attack. A regular, read-about-it-in-the newspaper shark attack.”

“But you did see, Keli. That changes things, eh.”

“I would’ve been a sacrifice rather than a victim? Is that what you’re saying? I suppose it wouldn’t have made any difference to me because I would have been dead.”     

“Yes, but you are not dead, but you should be. Chief Isikeli will want to see you now. You have honored him.”

“That’s all it took? I see a shark and now I’m an honored visitor?”

“You will be more than a honored visitor, brother.”

“You don’t suppose Sinaca became the shark so that I would be accepted in the village,” scoffed Compton.

Moses apparently had not considered this possibility and snapped his head around. “Tell no one those thoughts.” He spoke sharply and Compton was taken aback by its intensity. Before he could respond, Moses strode purposefully off towards the boat. “There is much to do.”

A skiff bearing two men at the oars and a third in the bow came around to the beach the next day. The man in the bow spoke Fijian and a younger man at the starboard oar translated in broken English. “Keli come to Vatusogosogo tomorrow for savusavu with Chief Isikeli?” Moses was also invited and would act as translator. Compton said that he would be honored. The three men bowed slightly and shoved off the beach, laboring on the oars against the current up around the East Point, presumably in search of Moses. 

Moses arrived the next afternoon on a southwesterly wind, which ruffled the far seas, churning white water in mid-channel. The boat was filled with sacks of belle and taro root. Out of one of the bags he lifted a parcel wrapped in newspaper. Inside was a carton of cigarettes and a carefully wrapped cloth containing a quantity of powered kava.

“Seven dollars for the cigarettes and kava. It is good kava, four years old.”

“I’ll take your word for it,” said Compton. “What astounds me is how those men who came yesterday found out so fast that I had seen the shark?”

“It is amazing thing, the Fiji communication. The messages spread from person to person. I told the first fisherman I met. He was not going to the village but he told the next fisherman who was, and off it goes. You tell one person on the sea and no matter where the message is to go, even to the far islands, it is passed along. Gifts of food are given for the trouble. It is better that way, eh. People stay close in friendship. We must go. You have what you need for many days?”

“How long will I be there?”

“You might be there for a week, maybe more.”

Compton gathered his bag and climbed into the boat. They swept down the island and around the West Point and into the bay of the resort, which was sheltered against the southwesterly. They rode the smooth water across the bay towards the Half Done Village, then turned east up the deep bay where green jungle met the water line.  On the opposite shore, Vatusogosogo, the Genuine Village, rose sharply up the hillside in the golden hues of twilight that colored the thatched huts ocher and ignited the coconut trees into spies of crimson flames. In this near magical light the village was breathtaking in its profound rootedness to the earth, trimmed shrubs and whitewashed rock lined pathways framed in flowerbeds spewing vibrant and exotic tinctures. People, brown and handsome in brightly colored dress as flowerbeds themselves, walked from hut to hut. Moses deposited Compton on the shoreline with the sacks of goods and then anchored the boat. He slogged ashore in the mud with his sulu raised up around his thighs. High on the hillside children ran towards them from every direction like flowers bowled on the evening breeze. They gathered in chestnut clusters around the two men and strung out behind them as they began to walk, cherubic faces shining with expectation. The men followed a dirt path up a steep incline and came upon two half-naked men working on the bare bones of a bure. One of the men was fitfully powerful in arm and shoulder, with dark eyes and a wide, sensual mouth. He was as handsome a man as Compton had ever seen. Moses introduced him as Lukey and his voice was as soft as his body was hard. He spoke proudly of their undertaking and Moses offered his compliments. After handshakes all around they continued their climb up the hill, passing open kitchens filled with families busy preparing the evening meal. Everyone lifted their eyebrows and extended broad welcoming smiles.

Near the far west end of the village, midway to the top of the hill, Moses came to a halt in front of a bure where appeared a rail-thin woman with tombstone teeth and a wide smile, who stood at attention in the doorway. Moses introduced her to Compton as Lavenia, wife of Vito. Her skin was the color of light chocolate and her nose saddled with a grove of freckles. Compton could not help but grin when he shook her hand. Lavenia good-naturedly shooed away the flock of children who had gathered like moths around this strange fire and led Compton into the bure. The interior was similar to Moses’ bure and Compton suspected that all bures of this type were more or less the same, clean and appointed with only the bare essentials -- a woven matted floor, a single wooden bed and a small dressing table. They sat in the middle of the floor and, while Lavenia passed the latest gossip to Moses, he translated. She maintained direct eye contact with Compton as though she were speaking to him. Vito was out in the bush collecting sweet potato. Her three children were off doing the laundry in a nearby stream. Cousins had gone to Suva. A wedding was planned soon for the son of a brother. The garden was doing well since the last hurricane.

Their conversation was interrupted by three children who appeared in the doorway obediently waiting to be invited inside the bure. The smallest was a boy introduced as Jack, who, with a sad smile revealed blackened stubs of rotten baby teeth. Beside him was his older brother, Paul, perhaps ten with an oversized head and dark, watery eyes. Carrying a full load of laundry was a young girl introduced as Kanesi. In her early teens, with her mother’s light skin and large, intelligent, almond shaped eyes with thick curling lashes and high cheekbones, she was beautiful. Lavenia sent her off to fetch Vito in the bush and she returned minutes later with him in hand. 

After introductions Vito led the way outside to the kitchen with young Jack resting in the crook of his arm. Vito, considerably older than Lavenia, was lean and strong in the body, his forehead inclined at a severe angle and his cheekbones unusually high, accenting wizened eyes that blinked intelligence and wit.

The kitchen was a square, separate structure, open midway to the ceiling. A fire burned in a raised pit where a steaming black kettle rested on an iron sheet. Shelves were filled with the similar cookware found in Mariah’s kitchen and they all sat at a rough-cut bench. While Lavenia poured lemon grass tea, Vito and Moses spoke earnestly in Fijian. A white dog came and sniffed at Compton and half a dozen chickens strayed through the dirt floor ecking for loose bits of food. Vito and Moses concluded their talk and in the last light Moses said to Compton, “It is time. They are waiting.”

Darkness, as it is want to do in the tropics, descended quickly from twilight and Compton stumbled up an eroded path behind Vito and Moses. The community silently watched the small procession from their kitchens. The quietude spoke of the event and its profound effect on everyone in the village. Compton could clearly sense something but could not put a name to it, like a dog picking up unregistered scents in an exotic garden. They arrived at the top of the hill where an old woman asked them to wait in a darkened bure twenty yards below that of the Chief’s. Moses instructed Compton to follow his every move once they entered the Chief’s bure. “Be humble, show no arrogance,” cautioned Moses.

Compton was first puzzled then a bit put off.  “Do you think I’m arrogant?”

Moses waved him off. “Now is not the time to tell you what I think.”

The woman returned and beckoned them into the bure of Chief Isikeli. Vito entered first followed by Moses and then Compton. The bure was much larger than any Compton had seen. It was empty except for an exquisite palm mat that covered the floor. Isikeli sat on the floor in front of a flickering lantern. He wore a dark sula, his chest bare and sagging with age. His eyes were narrowed to slits and his full head of white hair glowed in the recondite light. He produced a stately wave of his hand and the three men sat on the floor to face him. Vito began to speak in rapid, non-stop Fijian for five minutes. Isikeli listened without comment or expression. Vito then presented the kava and the cigarettes. Isikeli picked them up and held them aloft with a grand gesture, then spoke in an even, strong, voice. He then abruptly stood and the three men also rose and stood to face him. He crossed the room and shook Compton’s hand and said, “Welcome” in English. This was followed by words in Fijian, which Moses translated. “Now you are a member of this village. Your body and your soul is of this village. You are a brother and will forever be welcome.”