rth wanting to stay, he tore out my heart. My milk
turned to poison and killed our little child.

"I met long after with Mouth of God. He took me to his house in the
breadfruit-grove. He was good and gentle, but I was long in learning
to love him. It was the governor who made me know that I was his
woman. It came about in this manner:

"That governor was one whom all hated for his coldness and cruelty.
Mouth of God worked for him in the house where medicines are made,
having learned to mix the medicines in a bowl and to wrap cloths
about the wounds of those who were sick. One day, according to the
custom of white men who rule, the governor said to Mouth of God that
he must send me to the palace that night.

"When he came home to the house where we lived together, Mouth of
God gave me his word. He said: 'Go to the river and bathe. Put on
your crimson tunic and flowers in your hair and go to the palace. The
governor gives a feast to-night, and you are to dance and to sleep
in the governor's bed.'"

Malicious Gossip shuddered, and rocked herself to and fro upon the
mats. "Then I would have killed him! I cried out to him and said: 'I
will not go to the governor! He is a devil. My heart hates him. I am
a Marquesan. What have I to do with a man I hate?'"

"'Go!' said Mouth of God, and his eyes were hard as the black stones
of the High Place. 'The governor asks for you. He is the government.
Since when have Marquesan women said no to the command of the
_adminstrateur_?'

"I wept, but I took my brightest _kahu ropa_ from the sandalwood
chest my _Menike_ man had given me, and I went down the path to the
stream. As I went I wept, but my heart was black, and I thought to
take a keen-edged knife beneath my tunic when I went to the palace.
But my feet were not yet wet in the edge of the water when Mouth of
God called to me.

"'Do not go,' he said.

"I answered: 'I will go. You told me to go. I am on my way.' My
tears were salt in my mouth.

"'No!' said Mouth of God. He ran, and he came to me in the pool
where I had flung myself. There in the water he held me, and his
arms crushed the breath from my ribs. 'You will not go!' he said. 'I
spoke those words to know if you would go to the governor. If you
had gone quickly, if you had not wept, I would kill you. You are my
woman. No other shall have you.'

"Then I knew that I was his woman, and I forgot my _Menike_ lover.

"You see," she said to me after a pause, "I would ha