It was raining a little before noon, and now, standing on the veranda of my station, looking at the blue lagoon with the edge of a boiling surf, I was lucky not only to have one of the best paintings in the South Pacific, but to clearly smell the sweet aroma of flowers jasmine and wild lime in the jungle that covered the hillside behind me. I went to one end of the veranda and stopped watching a group of local girls who were preparing a tappa at the nearest hut – then to the other, and looked into my crowded copra shed and from it to the bare shelves of the large trading room.