Chapter LII

by William Somerset Maugham

　　I suppose the next three years were the happiest ofStrickland's life. Ata's house stood about eight kilometresfrom the road that runs round the island, and you went to italong a winding pathway shaded by the luxuriant trees of thetropics. It was a bungalow of unpainted wood, consisting oftwo small rooms, and outside was a small shed that served as akitchen. There was no furniture except the mats they used asbeds, and a rocking-chair, which stood on the verandah.Bananas with their great ragged leaves, like the tatteredhabiliments of an empress in adversity, grew close up to the house.There was a tree just behind which bore alligator pears,and all about were the cocoa-nuts which gave the landits revenue. Ata's father had planted crotons round his property,and they grew in coloured profusion, gay and brilliant;they fenced the land with flame. A mango grew in frontof the house, and at the edge of the clearing were twoflamboyants, twin trees, that challenged the gold of thecocoa-nuts with their scarlet flowers.Here Strickland lived, coming seldom to Papeete, on theproduce of the land. There was a little stream that ran notfar away, in which he bathed, and down this on occasion wouldcome a shoal of fish. Then the natives would assemble with spears,and with much shouting would transfix the great startledthings as they hurried down to the sea. Sometimes Stricklandwould go down to the reef, and come back with a basketof small, coloured fish that Ata would fry in cocoa-nut oil,or with a lobster; and sometimes she would make a savourydish of the great land-crabs that scuttled away under your feet.Up the mountain were wild-orange trees, and now andthen Ata would go with two or three women from the village andreturn laden with the green, sweet, luscious fruit. Then thecocoa-nuts would be ripe for picking, and her cousins (likeall the natives, Ata had a host of relatives) would swarm upthe trees and throw down the big ripe nuts. They split themopen and put them in the sun to dry. Then they cut out thecopra and put it into sacks, and the women would carry it downto the trader at the village by the lagoon, and he would givein exchange for it rice and soap and tinned meat and a little money.Sometimes there would be a feast in the neighbourhood,and a pig would be killed. Then they would go and eatthemselves sick, and dance, and sing hymns.But the house was a long way from the village, and theTahitians are lazy. They love to travel and they love togossip, but they do not care to walk, and for weeks at a timeStrickland and Ata lived alone. He painted and he read, andin the evening, when it was dark, they sat together on theverandah, smoking and looking at the night. Then Ata had ababy, and the old woman who came up to help her through hertrouble stayed on. Presently the granddaughter of the oldwoman came to stay with her, and then a youth appeared -- noone quite knew where from or to whom he belonged -- but hesettled down with them in a happy-go-lucky way, and they alllived together,