I can only relate this narrative now, since Rupert died last winter and my own professional career is some years past and beyond damage. Thomas Rupert left no family, and my own contributions to the discipline are said and done. But the singular nature and explosive excitement of that expedition -- my first fieldwork -- and the subsequent disruptive personal events, at last merit a proper hearing.
It was late in Easter term, early June, over forty years ago. Rupert asked to speak to me after seminar, and my initial jolt of worry was for my academic performance, although I thought I had been suitably attentive. But my fears, on that score at least, were groundless.
'What will you be doing this summer, Gerald?' He peered down at me over the oval spectacles resting on his long narrow nose, tie knotted closely, brown hair thinning. His appearance, as always, expressed a quiet composure.
'I expect I will work in Father's finance office in London, as I have the past two summers.'
He regarded this in silence for a moment. 'Are you perhaps game for a greater challenge than the wilds of London?' His eyebrows arched.
I knew Rupert had fieldwork upcoming in Melanesia but did not know the specifics.
'I realise this is frightfully short notice, also that you may perhaps feel insulted at the fact that you are not my first choice. Jonathan has only just informed me of his unavailability, despite committing to the project months ago, but at least that explains my execrable timing.' He looked for my reaction but I displayed none.
'I shall have need of an assistant this summer. For two months. I cannot offer you much of a stipend but all expenses are funded, and it is not unlikely that this endeavour may provide a lifetime opportunity for a scholar with some ambition.'
'You are aware of the drawbacks of fieldwork?' he asked softly. The query was quite unnecessary. Of course I was. Tropical hardships are not difficult to imagine. I was acquainted with the relevant anthropological literature and had heard enough first-hand anecdotes in seminar to list them quite well: insects, snakes, oppressive heat, rain and mud, uncomfortable quarters, almost inevitable tension if not actual hostility from natives, dodgy food, and no guarantee of arriving home in good health, if at all.
'Where, sir? I should like to hear more.'
'A remote valley in highlands Papua New Guinea. You recollect the Baruya?' I nodded. 'This would be their nearest neighbours, the Warana, just over the ridge. Barely a generation removed from initial contact with Europeans.' He paused. 'And head-hunting.' I found myself trying to imagine Father's reaction. Predicting my mother's was rather easier.
We talked. He mentioned some remarkable sexual customs that merited study. I found some of the details at the limits of credibility. My duties would not be inconsiderable, keeping notes, writing accounts, attending to supplies and equipment, acting as his right-hand man, although he wryly noted the fact that I was 'left-handed'.
It was a three-month study, but funds allowed my participation for only the first two, he had another associate coming for the last four weeks. I asked for a day to think it over and he agreed. I little expected that events would bring us to the boundaries of the discipline's ethics.
'Of course. Do sleep on it.' He patted my shoulder, the first time I recollect he had ever touched me, then turned and walked diagonally across Second Court. I watched the movements of his angular frame, the precision of his stride, the self-contained focus of his academic presence. At the time I envied his freedom to set foot on the hallowed grass, a privilege only offered to fellows of the college, certainly not first-year MPhil students like myself.
So it was that I found myself three weeks later stepping off BOAC Flight 106 onto the tarmac of Port Moresby, nine degrees of latitude south of the equator, the air smiting my face like a steam towel from the barber. It took a another long, hard week's slog by small boat and foot into the hills, Rupert alternately threatening and cajoling porters while we ferried ourselves and our supplies to the hamlet of Niguru.
The first sight of the village was not encouraging. The bamboo and grass houses looked sturdy enough on the outside, but the piles of refuse stacked at the village edge, including quite a few animal bones with bits of rotting flesh still attached, were not cause for great confidence.
The headman Talu, skin smeared with reddish pigment, greeted us warily. Rupert had indicated that they were known to each other, but I detected no sign of great friendliness. The other men, quite naked save for dried gourd-skins covering their genitals, stood behind Talu. Their skin was dark, their hair woolly.
None were taller than myself at five-foot ten, but all were well-built, from lean and sinewy to quite muscular. Various piercings filled with bone ornaments were present in noses and ears. I would not have relished a scuffle with any one of them. There was no sign of women or male children under the age of eight or so.
My knees were sore from the last steep ascent up the muddy hillside, wet from the late afternoon rainstorm. I would have given a month's wages for a proper pint of cool bitter, but I knew that that was pure dreaming on my part.
We were given a small corner of the village, which was just a clearing in the forest with a few crop fields adjacent, to set up our tent. My hardest adjustment for the next few days was the complete absence of privacy. Every action I took was scrutinised, from lacing boots to teeth-brushing to the use of the latrine itself.
Eyes followed our every move, and Akum, the interpreter Rupert had employed, was kept busy translating the villagers' questions. Why did we need to scrape our faces with sharp knives every morning? Why did we cover our skin with cloth so completely? Did we have brothers? Wives? What manner of weapons did we possess?
We took our time settling in, despite our impatience to quickly make friends and initiate our information gathering. But establishing relationships is time-consuming even in optimal conditions, and we needed to move deliberately.
We spent many hours in the men's long-house, perhaps forty feet in length, made of lashed bamboo with a palm-frond thatched roof. The sexes in the village were divided quite explicitly. Rupert had cautioned me not to look too closely at the females, as unclothed as the men save for short woven-bark skirts.
Unattached men and older boys all slept in this one main hut. Married men had their own small huts with their wives, but also spent a good part of the day in the men's communal dwelling. 'Predominantly patrivirilocal' Rupert had indicated. The men's long-house was a dank, uncomfortable place for me, debris and dried vegetation littered the floor, often fruit peelings cast aside, and the smell of urine from underneath the vegetal litter was unmistakable.
It became quite apparent that the male hierarchy was strict and complex. When the older men wanted to speak of anything sexual or warlike, they would order the younger boys out on trivial errands, cutting bamboo, repairing a fence. The youngsters went grudgingly, they knew they were missing 'adult' talk.
I had wondered what Rupert would be like in camp. He treated me well, although he made it clear I was his subordinate. At university his shirts were always ironed, his flannels impeccable. He still wore white shirts, although of rougher fabric, and of course they stayed neither clean or unrumpled. I marvelled at his confidence when dealing with the villagers however, alternately amiable then quite definite in his requests.
