Epilogue: The Winners

December 25, 1863, Easter Island

The ship docked at Hanga Pika was being boarded by the only passengers headed back to the United States. First, John Ericsson and his wife, Amelia, walked slowly up the ramp. They both stood at the gangway and waved at the only other couple near the bottom. Dana Greene and his wife, Anna, who held their new daughter, Cristina Marie, were following the Eriksson’s and were half-way up the ramp.

The ship, the American merchant U.S.S. Wachusett, under Captain Robert W. Schufeldt, had arrived despite the plague of smallpox. All crew members had been inoculated with the vaccine of cow pox, the same vaccination that Captain Ericsson had used to save the remaining natives on Easter Island.

Captain Ericsson walked alone into Captain Schufeldt's cabin and sat down in a chair in front of the commanding officer's desk. Captain Schufeldt sat behind it, smoking a long briar pipe. He was a tall man, distinguished with large mutton chops and a thick, New York accent. He pointed to a stack of papers on his desk. "Thank you for coming, Captain Ericsson. These journals will be collected and used in our inquiry when we arrive back in the States. As we are still in a state of war, you and Lieutenant Greene will be considered my prisoners until we can consider the evidence in this matter."

"I appreciate it, Captain," said Ericsson, and he cleared his throat. "I welcome your understanding of the delicate nature of our plight. The experience of my group needs to be kept secret from the prying eyes of the public. I am happy the government believes this to be the best possible solution to the problem we have at present."

"Yes, President Lincoln has been advised concerning your adventure. Because your monitors are doing much to assist our naval advances against the rebel forces, it has been Mister Lincoln's decision to keep the details of your trip a secret. However, the matter of the deaths of Mister and Missus Walter Sinclair, Charles Jefferson, and Charles McCord will be thoroughly investigated in the official inquiry. That's why these journals will be important."

"Thank you, Captain. I appreciate the importance of these documents. It is rather ironic that our captors allowed us to keep these journals even during our internment. I suppose it could be considered our Babylonian captivity, of sorts. I have been reading the Bible regularly during these last few months, and it occurs to me that I never really appreciated its relevance to mankind's travails until it related to my own experience. I shall continue to read it with utmost scrutiny in the future."

"Captain Ericsson, as it is Christmas, I would like to take this opportunity to allow you to tell me, in your own words, what occurred over these months at this god-forsaken island. It will be completely off the record, mind you, and I shall give you my word as an officer and a gentleman that none of it will ever be revealed."

"We came to Easter Island because we wanted to establish a civilized colony modeled after the Platonic ideals of the Republic. Sadly, what we found here was a land ravaged by wars between the elite, which resulted in the obliteration of most natural resources and the alienation of the population into a cult that followed a pagan god of fertility and practiced contests such as the Bird Man competition. This was an event that occurred each year to determine a god-man who would be given complete rule over the island and its remaining resources. The people who followed this Bird Man were called the Fainga, and they were the elite group that survived following the Moai statue wars between the Hanau Eepe and Hanau Momoko. When we arrived, a man who was posing as a Jesuit priest, Father Perez, tricked us into competing in the Bird Man contest and he used the winner, our own steward, Mister Chip Jefferson, as his ruse to take over the island populace. At that time, there were only over eight hundred natives, as fifteen-hundred of them had been captured by Peruvian slave traders one year previously."

"Yes, we have heard of these slave traders. They bring disease to the natives, and many thousands have been killed off all over the Polynesian islands," Captain Schufeldt interjected.

"Indeed, and it was this disease that saved our lives, Captain, if you will bear with me. Father Perez turned out to be renegade Harvard Anthropologist, Dr. John Garvey, who had written about a theory he had to control native populations through their original scriptures. In this case, the islanders had what are called the rongo-rongo tablets, which contain hieroglyphic symbols that have meaning only to the shamans of the tribes. Garvey came here to see if he could prove his hypothesis, and when we landed, with our inventions and our weapons, he at last had his chance to take total control."

Captain Schufeldt tapped his pipe with the back of his hand and shook burnt tobacco out. "Go on, Captain, this is quite intriguing. What did he do with these tablets to obtain control?"

"After our Chip won the Bird Man contest, Garvey got his natives to arrest all of us, and he told the lad that Chip was the prophetic coming of the so-called Black Bird Man. This was the special person who would come from afar to establish a new era of peace and abundance here on the island. The natives believed him, and our Chip played along with this false shaman, Garvey, until the day the sacrifices began."

"Sacrifices? What were they sacrificing?"

"I'm afraid to say that Garvey had gone over the edge into madness. He was going to sacrifice one of us each month until their god of fertility, Meke-Meke, was appeased. The first sacrificial offering was to take place on November fifteenth. But first, Garvey had to get all his participants into their proper places. Thus, he recruited Mister Charles McCord, my lead draftsman, to become the master-at-arms of his cache of hallucinogens, a type of mushroom that grows in the base of the island volcanoes. He also added Missus Walter Sinclair and my Lieutenant Dana Greene to become officials at these drug- induced fertility rituals that were conducted in what he called the 'spirit room.' I am sad to say that my own wife, Amelia, was also chosen to become a pagan handmaiden at these rituals of debauchery and carnal revelry. Of course, as I was still being held in our prison at the Maunga Terevaka volcano on the other side of the island, I did not know exactly what each of my compatriots was doing. However, I was soon to find out."

"How dreadful! All this seems to prove how mankind will indeed revert to savagery when Nature and God have been forsaken," said Schufeldt, twisting in his seat and leaning forward in anticipation of the next part of Ericsson's story.

"Savagery is a friendly word for what began to take place on this island, Captain. The Captain of our ship, Mister Walter Sinclair, was residing with me in our prison, and I suppose he was becoming increasingly desperate. I did not realize just how desperate until November the fifteenth arrived. We had been confined in our prison cells for over a month, along with Missus Anna Greene, who was then quite heavy with child. Meanwhile, Professor Garvey had continued with his fertility rituals and the so-called 'translations' of the rongo-rongo tablets. Nobody, not even the Bird Man, knew who was to be sacrificed first, but when they came to take Anna away, we all knew."

"Good God, man! How monstrous!"

"Yes, Garvey wisely kept Mister Greene away from the sacrificial hut. The death blow was about to be struck on the poor woman and her child when Dr. Garvey began to vomit profusely. His entire body began to shake, and he fell into a visible swoon upon the floor. Of course, the sacrifice could not continue, and it was the smallpox that had reached its first victim. It seems the Peruvian slave traders must have brought the virus with them when they ravaged the island, and it had not developed until that very night when Professor Garvey was struck down. Luckily, Anna Greene was taken back to her cell, and we were given a reprieve. Lieutenant Greene came back with her to watch after his wife."

"Good! Now what happened?"

"At last, I had a bargaining chip to play. I had brought with us a small amount of cowpox vaccine, first developed by Edward Jenner in England in 1796. I knew if Garvey were given it soon enough, there was a good chance his smallpox would recede, and I told him so when he came to see if I could do anything for him. He had already taken charge of our vessel, the HMS Caine, yet he knew nothing about my storehouse of drugs. Thus, I offered to give Garvey the vaccine if he would, in exchange, allow me my freedom to vaccinate others in the populace, to protect them from almost certain death in the coming days."

"Well, he didn't refuse, did he?"

"No, I was given my freedom, and he was given his life. He was soon to regret his decision. I gave him his inoculation, and I also met with the Black Bird Man to give him his. That was when I discovered that Chip Jefferson had convinced the one-hundred tribesmen of the lower village of Hanga Roa, together with King Maurata, their leader, to attack the Orongo Village. It seems a native girl named Kaimi could speak English, and she had become enamored of Mister Jefferson. She was able to persuade the men to make war that following night."

"Bold move, Captain! I could not have done better myself," said Schufeldt.

"Indeed, but that night, when the natives began attacking, many of the warriors of the Fainga clan in Orongo Village were too sick to fight. Professor Garvey saw that his men were being overcome by the healthy men of the King's tribe, and he panicked. He realized that Walter Sinclair still had the keys to the ship's armory, which held the only weapon that could equalize the odds at that moment in the battle. He sent two natives to fetch Sinclair from his cell, and that's when the tides changed. Sinclair opened the locked armory, but he soon picked up a weapon and shot the two natives dead. He then carried the Gatling Machine Gun up to Orongo Village and set it up in the village square."

"The Gatling? What a stroke of luck! That monster can fire over 600 rounds per minute."

"Indeed, but the person firing it became enraged with jealousy when he saw his wife dancing nude for the Black Bird Man, Chip Jefferson, inside the spirit hut. Did I mention that Walter Sinclair was a racist and supporter of the Southern cause? He shot and killed his own wife, Penelope, Mister Charles McCord, and poor Chip Jefferson, and the tribal chaos that ensued was disastrous. When Sinclair finally ran out of ammunition, over one hundred Fainga warriors were dead, and Walter Sinclair was stabbed to death by the remaining men. What Sinclair and Garvey did not know was that the culture of war amongst the Polynesian peoples is not an affair of complete annihilation as it is in the so-called 'civilized' countries such as our own. Instead, the victorious warrior will take on the name of the warrior he kills in battle—strictly a hand-to-hand affair—and his entire tribe will afterward have a feast to honor the dead enemy. What Sinclair did to these natives broke all bounds of civility and justice for these people, and it proved the undoing of Garvey's anthropological experiment. The natives revolted, and the remaining natives became quite enraged when they discovered Garvey's identity and trickery. He was pushed down into the Rano Cao volcano, together with the sacred rongo-rongo tablets. They also blew-up our ship, exploding the armory, and the craft was nothing but cinders the next day. I officiated in the crowning of the new King, and the Bird Man cult was officially banished from the island. You arrived months following, and the rest will come out at our inquiry state-side, I trust."

Captain Schufeldt stood up and vigorously shook John Ericsson's hand. "Thank you, Captain; I am glad you have been honest with me. I am certain things will go well for you at the inquiry. You are a man of reason and compassion."

John left the captain's stateroom and walked amidships to his own cabin. Amelia was standing in the doorway, but she was frowning. "What's the matter, love?" Ericsson asked, taking her softly by her supple shoulders and kissing her cheek.

"This is the first time in months we will be sleeping in a proper bed," she said, wrinkling up her nose.

"Yes? I agree. It will be quite a change," John said.

"John, do you still love me?" she asked, slowly dropping her dress to the floor, exposing her lattice pattern of native tattooing all over her bare legs.

This was the first time Ericsson had seen his wife's legs under a light, and he enjoyed what he saw. The thought of his wife's native intrigue under the stars on Easter Island would be their secret for years to come. "Dance for me, love," said John, and Amelia began to shake.

* * *

At the base of the ship, standing among the remaining population of Easter Island, one hundred and nine citizens in all, were Chip Jefferson and his new wife, Kaimi Jefferson. Chip was dressed in native attire as was his lovely young wife, and their expressions told the story of the pain and tragic adversity that had taken place over the last few months.

As the U.S.S. Wachusett pulled out from the bay, Chip and Kaimi turned their backs to it as the sun retreated into the South Pacific. They did not want to watch the ship leave because they had the beginnings of a new family right where they were. Although Chip knew he could never be the Bird Man again, he was happy to start over. Captain Ericsson had agreed to lie about his death so he could stay on Easter Island, and Chip would forever be grateful. Ericsson said that it would be most difficult to explain away Chip's conspiracy with Dr. Garvey, and it was best that he settle with his new love. The land would again begin to flourish, under the careful husbandry of the remaining natives, and no longer would racism and greed rule the day. Chip knew they were a microcosm of what happened in many other lands, all over the world, and the lessons they learned were well worth the experience.