Gracie and Flora appeared in their best dresses, and M. Perouse said, “Girls, I’ve arranged with Mr. Crompton for each of you to get a thousand pounds when you land in Sydney.”
Flora kissed M. Perouse and Gracie kissed me, adding, “That’s mighty sweet of you, Herbert.” Normally I dislike being called by my first name, but we had all enjoyed such a splendid time at La Fécondité that I did not protest. I was, however, totally disgusted and even outraged by what happened next.
M. Perouse made a little speech in which he said, “I am desolate about your departure, but as I explained I am at heart a Frenchman and much as I love the English language I am not at ease in it. As I grow older I want to have French things about me. French wines. French songs. The good French language of my youth.” Then all three of them began to weep, M. Perouse too. I was humiliated, but still I hadn’t heard the worst, for he added tearfully, “I have a Marseillaise girl coming up on the next Trapas plane.”
The girls cried some more and said they hoped he would be very happy. When they boarded the seaplane, the girls screamed back to the crowded deck, “Au revoir, Monsoor Jean!” and Gracie embarrassed me frightfully by shouting, “Thanks for the thousand quid, Herbert!” I considered trying to explain to those on the dock that I was not giving her the money, but everyone was weeping, so I said nothing.
At this point I was willing never to see M. Perouse again, for I could scarcely countenance the things he did, and this matter of throwing out the Australian girls to make way for a Marseillaise was so absurd as to be revolting, and not solely because the losers happened to be of British stock but rather because it seemed an offense against the decencies. In fact, my association with M. Perouse had corrupted me to the point where I was beginning to think that a man need merely wave his hand and beautiful girls would come running, but I reflected that my host’s three million francs probably had a lot to do with it.
Much as I wished to leave La Fécondité, my Government directed me to report further on the likelihood of fresh labor troubles, and so reluctantly I returned to the plantation, where I interviewed this chap Nguyen Bo. Again I took pains to remind him that the British Government was not officially involved, in that the French were solely responsible for Oriental affairs, but I did let him know that I was interested in the problem so far as basic justice was concerned.
Nguyen Bo, when interviewed alone, was an astonishing person, astonishing. He weighed not over eight stone, had black teeth from betel juice, sharp little eyes and a nervousness one does not customarily associate with Orientals. It was his living quarters, however, which affected me most.
As you know, when the Tonkinese were first brought into our islands the planters devised a cheap, rapidly constructed type of housing for them. A lozenge-like foundation thirty feet long and eleven feet wide was built of coconut logs and coral. Across the middle a solid wall was erected, creating two living spaces fifteen feet by eleven, each with a curved lip. Into every one of these halves a complete Tonkinese family was moved, and since to build windows in the walls would have cost extra money, the hordes of yellow people lived in unventilated squalor. Although I am more aware than most of the many stupid mistakes we English have made around the world—for example, many of my superiors have, I am ashamed to say, been very ordinary men—I do not honestly believe that in any colony of ours we would have permitted this particular offense against human beings.
Nguyen Bo’s half-lozenge was a revelation. It was whitewashed, very clean, most orderly and withal somewhat attractive. He said, “My wife, two daughters and three sons live here.” I could say nothing.
He went on to tell me that his people were still pressing for the same points, which he did not bore me with by repeating. He said there was no disposition to cause trouble, but that some of his friends had spirited out a long report to the United Nations at Lake Success. I tried to hide my surprise and asked if the French knew of this and he said, “Not yet.”
I then tried to ascertain how an unlettered Tonkinese, smothered in a jungle, could have heard of the United Nations, let alone submit a report. I questioned him directly on this and discovered that it had been smuggled out by Gracie Dalrymple. She was the redheaded girl from Sydney. “She couldn’t have written it,” I argued, for lovely as Gracie’s singing voice was, I doubt if she could write her own name. Thereupon Nguyen assured me that it had been written in French, from which I deduced that Jean Perouse himself must have been the author. Nguyen Bo would not confirm my guess and begged me not to mention it to anyone else, lest it reflect discredit on the Frenchman as a kind of traitor to his class, and this is the first time I have divulged my belief, although subsequent events have more than substantiated my rather shrewd deduction.
As I was leaving the lozenge there was a great commotion about the big house of La Fécondité and I saw to my amazement that a piano was being moved in! It had come from Sydney on the last Morinda and must have cost a fortune. As I watched its progress through the door, M. Perouse rushed out with a cablegram and cried, “Danielle said there was only one thing needed for her complete happiness. A piano!”
“Who is Danielle?” I inquired.
“La Marseillaise!” he cried ecstatically. Then he showed me the cable. Danielle said that since she had never before been in the South Pacific, and since the trip out was a very long one—this was a most remarkable and expensive cable, sent collect—and since she feared loneliness she was bringing along another girl who sang with her in the café. But they had to have a piano!
On the next Trapas the two girls arrived. They were tall, sparkling-eyed and very French. Danielle was the prettier of the two, but Alceste had the finer sense of humor, a trait which I prize greatly. Even before they landed they completely captivated everyone on the dock, and for the next weeks La Fécondité was the gayest it had ever been.
Danielle played the piano competently and Alceste joined with her in delightful French songs, although I must in all fairness say that their voices were somewhat pinched in comparison with the fine, strong voices of the Australian girls. All the unattached young Frenchmen of the island, and some of the attached ones as well, made La Fécondité their headquarters, and even though the French girls did not accept me with quite the openhearted friendship the Australians had extended, I nevertheless grew to consider myself a member of the household. I may add that I now kept my luggage at La Fécondité, where M. Perouse had kindly allocated me a permanent room.
The big event naturally was Bastille Day, a typically French holiday, but one in which all men of good will can properly join, since a triumph of human freedom in one corner of the world is a triumph everywhere. I therefore decided to stay for the festivities and on July 12 guests began to assemble from many plantations, but I saw with alarm that many of the men were arriving with guns. One of the planters said, “Sooner or later there’s going to be trouble,” and he intimated that he and his friends would know what to do.
An entire room was set aside for alcohol, to which I am addicted in moderation, not to the point certainly of being an embarrassment either to myself or others. The day of the thirteenth was spent mostly in drinking, since it would have been ungracious to have launched formal festivities before all the guests had arrived.
That evening, at the close of a long and pleasant day in which I must say I upheld my half of the Condominium, I was recovering in the belvedere, where the cool breezes helped clear my head, but I looked up the channel and saw a most distressing sight. From a nearby island two large canoes had set out for the upper reaches of La Fécondité. At first I assumed they were filled with natives bringing in more fish or chicken for the feast next day, but as I studied the craft I realized with apprehension that each canoe was loaded brimful with Tonkinese! I watched for some moments and saw two rather clumsy barges, each jammed to the Plimsoll line with Orientals.
Seeking not to alarm anyone, I left the belvedere quietly and found M. Perouse, in a rather intoxicated condition, beating time while
Danielle sang French cabaret songs. With some difficulty I got him to his feet and asked the girl to leave us alone for a moment.
“M. Perouse,” I whispered. “If I can judge correctly, more than two hundred Tonkinese have converged on La Fécondité.”
He looked at me, first with rather bleary eyes and then with increasingly steady ones. “Mr. Crompton,” he said slowly. “Are you sober enough to drive me a few miles?”
“Certainly,” I said, for although I may not have covered myself with distinction as a government official in the New Hebrides, I must honestly admit that I have yet to find the Frenchman who has ever, as the Americans say, “put me under the table.”
It was a macabre drive. Around us the jungle seemed to resent our coming. Long runners of vine slipped across the road and our headlights cast weird reflections on huge leaves. As we drove, M. Perouse became quite sober and said, “Crompton, I hope I haven’t let you in for something messy. Are you armed?”
“No,” I said.
“Good,” he replied. “I prefer them to see that I have no weapons.”
We now started to overtake straggling Tonkinese workmen, each carrying some kind of implement, but none, as far as I could see, with guns. When they first saw the jeep they stared in open animosity, but when they discovered that it was M. Perouse they watched our progress with passive masks.
We came at last to a large coconut grove where several bonfires had been lit. The smoke, curling upward, was grotesque. M. Perouse left the jeep, a stocky, handsome figure of a man. He went right up to a group of Tonkinese and started to argue with them. In a few moments he called me over to verify some points.
I said that La Fécondité was filled with planters who had assembled to celebrate Bastille Day. I assured them that the French had not collected an arsenal for an attack upon the Tonkinese.
“We saw guns!” they replied.
“A few,” I said. “Like you, the Frenchmen are frightened.”
“Can we believe that?”
“Look for yourselves. We are not armed.”
One of the Tonks cried, “But what about the jeep?”
A dozen men ran over and ransacked the car, finding only a bottle of vermouth which M. Perouse had forgotten. “You can have it,” he said, and for a moment there was a bit of merriment to relieve the tension.
But as the Tonkinese passed the bottle, there was a sound of rifles in the distance and in a moment Nguyen Bo rushed up in a truck. “They are attacking our huts!” he shouted.
Immediately there was great confusion, during which the Tonkinese grabbed both M. Perouse and me. “Nguyen!” Perouse shouted, but the noise was so great that the Tonkinese leader did not hear. So each of us shouted and finally he came to where we were held prisoners.
“Nguyen,” M. Perouse pleaded. “If trouble has started only you and I can stop it. Please work with me.”
The little man reflected for a moment and said no. The French had begun this …
“How can you be so sure?”
“Only the French have rifles.”
“But look over there, Nguyen. Four of your men have guns.”
“M. Perouse!” the wiry man interrupted. “It is the Tonkinese who are dead. I know, because one of them was my wife.”
There was a deathly silence as this news passed among the enraged workmen, but Perouse would not be deflected from his purpose. “All the more reason, my friend, why you and I should prevent more shooting.” He shook himself loose and went to his wizened little foreman. “Nguyen,” he said quietly, “we must go.”
We climbed into the jeep while four Tonkinese with rifles hung onto the frame. Nguyen said they would kill us if there was any trickery. To this M. Perouse did not even reply.
We reached the northern end of the Tonkinese hovels to find the entire population in a state of hysteria. Some drunken planters had detected the passage of many workmen through the jungle. The Orientals were challenged and some fool discharged his rifle. A Tonkinese was killed, perhaps a planter, too. Then a group of planters had rushed out of the big house and had begun to shoot wildly. Two more Tonkinese were killed in the native huts, one of them Nguyen Bo’s wife. Now there was desultory firing in the distance.
Nguyen and Perouse studied each other. Finally the Frenchman said, “My friend, this had to happen. You and I know that. Now we must stop it.”
He left me as hostage, a not unwilling one if my staying could help prevent bloodshed, while he and Nguyen, followed by the four riflemen, started down the trail on foot. At the top of his voice Perouse kept shouting, “My friends! Hold your fire!” I last saw him going forward, his hands in the air, pleading for a truce.
It was not until next day that I learned what happened. As the six men approached the plantation a Frenchman cried, “Perouse, you stinking traitor!” Some enraged fool shot into the crowd and killed Nguyen Bo, whereupon the Tonkinese riflemen aimed at Perouse, who fell into the dust of the very plantation he had spent years in perfecting.
I shall gloss over my own experiences. When news of the tragedy reached my guards I was beaten a bit but I suffered no real harm. After two days I was released, and when I staggered back to La Fécondité my heart stopped for a moment.
The Tonkinese had fired one corner of the big house. The Frenchmen had wrecked two of the small kiosks. There was no sign of life and the ambulance driver said, “It was a very bad night. All Tonkinese are under arrest. We have issued guns to the white men.”
At the hospital, the doctor said there was nothing wrong with me except bruise and shock. He said he would, however, keep me with him for some days as a precaution. I was led to a small room, where to my amazed delight I found Jean Perouse propped up in bed.
He was badly wounded, a portion of his face having been blown away. But with one unbandaged eye and one corner of his mouth he grinned. Through jaws wired together he said, “We accomplished little, old man.”
We lay there for many days because it seemed that one of the kicks at my kidneys had caused a minor infection. M. Perouse said that he had never understood why people could not live together peacefully. He told me that only one good thing had come out of that terrible night. The laws binding Tonkinese to expired contracts had been rescinded. He explained that a report had reached the United Nations and in self-defense the French Government had revoked the law.
He added that the piano had been wrecked and that he was considered to be a traitor by his countrymen, none of whom came to see him. I said I could not understand such a judgment against a man who was obviously acting in the common good. He laughed and said, “Times change and opinions follow. In a year it’ll be forgotten, because this time I was right.”
Tears came to his cheek and I thought that his ostracism had cut deeper than he admitted, but he said, “The worst blow is that Danielle and Alceste have not even bothered to visit me. Who can blame them? They must believe what their friends say. Danielle is marrying a planter in Efate. Alceste is singing in Noumea.” He folded his hands and seemed so dispirited that I forebore reminding him that the Australian girls Flora and Gracie would never have deserted him that way in a time of danger because it is not the British custom to do so.
I did not see M. Perouse again for nearly a year. Then it became my duty to deliver some papers to him regarding the arrest of Phyllis Crump in Singapore. It seems she had with her four French railway bonds which had been traced to La Fécondité, from where she must have stolen them.
I had been instructed to deliver the documents in person, since the complaint had to be signed before a witness, and as soon as I entered the gates to La Fécondité I felt my spirits rise. There was the same clean wire, the scraped roads, the well-tended cacao with its leaves glistening in the sunlight. At the Tonkinese quarters new whitewash had been applied and all the middle walls had been knocked out so that each family could have double space.
I must admit that I found petty pleasure in the fact that whereas all other plantations seemed to lack labor, my
friend—for I have grown proud to call M. Perouse my friend even though his inherited patterns of behavior are often offensive to British sensibilities—had all he needed.
La Fécondité flourished. Damage had been repaired and the very sight of this productive land made my spirits soar, but as I stood there surveying the scenes I had grown to love, I heard a strange sound from within the house, as if a once-fine piano were being played out of tune. I listened for some moments but could not discern what it was that I was hearing. Finally I knocked on the door, and the haunting sounds stopped.
M. Perouse appeared, and for a moment I suffered an involuntary shock, for the left side of his face was a nasty scar. He sensed my discomfort and ran his hand across the scar, saying, “It doesn’t hurt, Crompton. I was fortunate.”
He took me into his spacious living room, which was more polished and attractive than ever. I came immediately to the point, as is my custom on official visits, and showed him the reports from the Singapore police. He studied them casually and then broke into a wide grin which pulled up the scarred lips.
“Four railway bonds,” he laughed. “All these many papers about four railway bonds! Which I gave to the young lady.”
I was unable to dissuade him from this story and said that I would have to have a sworn deposition from him to that effect. “But naturally!” he said with great affability. “Write what is necessary and I’ll swear to it.”
I could not myself take such a light view of legal procedures which in their day have saved many innocent lives and helped preserve the civilized decencies, but I composed some lies which sounded plausible and he signed them. Then we needed a witness to attest the signature and he said, “Some of the French planters will be coming out tonight, but let’s get the business finished now.” He rang a bell and a native girl appeared. “You run catchim Quoyn,” he said.
I was dreadfully embarrassed when the Tonkinese arrived, an intelligent-looking young man who was introduced as the new forman of La Fécondité. In a whispered consultation I had to inform M. Perouse that in a Singapore court the signature of some unknown Oriental named Quoyn would be worse than useless. It would prejudice the deposition.