"I am delighted to hear it," I said, "for we have paid dearly enough
already for our folly in coming to this island, without being called
upon to pay the additional penalty of that poor old chap's life. We
have lost two of our number in the attack upon the ship, while the three
hands who took you ashore yesterday are missing--and, by the by, where
is Maybury?"
"Dead, poor chap, I am sorry to say--murdered by those treacherous
scoundrels of natives," answered Cunningham. "The way of it was this.
When we landed we were immediately surrounded by a mob of blacks; and
just for a moment I had a shadowy suspicion that things were not quite
all that they ought to be. But as I looked round I saw that the natives
were all unarmed; and, moreover, they were all smiling and apparently in
the best of tempers--indeed, one of them, a girl, flung a garland of
flowers round my neck, either as a joke or a sign of goodwill, I didn't
quite know which--so I took it for granted that they were friendly
disposed, and we all got laughing and joking together. Then the
skipper, Maybury, and I gradually worked our way through the crowd, and,
accompanied by the men who had wood to sell, walked up through the
village, which seemed to be inhabited chiefly by naked little
piccaninnies, playing in the sand with the dogs, and women.
"The village is about a quarter of a mile in length, and beyond it there
are about twenty acres of cleared ground, planted with manioc, cassava,
corn, and fruit trees--principally bananas, beyond which is the virgin
forest. Toward this we made our way, and, entering it, followed a bush
path for about a quarter of a mile, until we reached a small open space.
We had scarcely entered this when the three pretended sandalwood
merchants simultaneously turned upon us, and, uttering a terrific yell,
seized each of us by the arms, which they tried to confine behind our
backs. Taken unawares though I was, I struggled fiercely to throw off
my particular assailant, but the beggar was a big sinewy chap, with
muscles like steel, and ere I could wrench myself clear about a dozen
other blacks sprang into the enclosure, evidently in response to the
shout raised by our captors; and before I well knew what was happening I
found myself upon the ground, with three or four savages sitting upon
me, while others were binding me hand and foot. While I was still
struggling I heard the pop of a revolver twice, the reports being so
close together that I knew at once they must have come from different
weapons; and the next instant I heard a dull crack, a groan, and the
fall of two heavy bodies upon the dry leaves and twigs which carpeted
the floor of the open space where the struggle had taken place. Then,
when my captors had effectually secured my limbs, they raised me to my
feet, and I saw the skipper lying, face downward, about a yard away,
with his head bare, a small stream of blood trickling from it and
clotting among his grey hair; while close to him lay Maybury on his
back, quite dead, with a long spear driven right through his heart.
"The blacks turned the skipper over, examined him closely, and then,
finding that he was not dead, held some sort of consultation in their
own language, the purport of which of course I could not gather; but the
end of it was that they hoisted both of us upon their shoulders, carried
us back to the village, and thrust us into one of the huts, where we lay
untended for the remainder of the day and practically the whole of last
night. Then some time--about the small hours I think it must have
been--a girl, who proved to be the same who had flung the garland of
flowers round my neck, stole into the hut as silently as a ghost, laid
her finger upon my lips--to indicate, I suppose, that I was not to
talk--and deftly proceeded to cast adrift my bonds; after which she
proceeded vigorously to chafe my ankles and wrists, in order to restore
the circulation, which had been practically suspended by the tightness
with which the ligatures had been bound. And look here, Temple, if you
should ever chance to have an enemy, and have a fancy to torture him,
just bind his wrists and ankles tightly together and leave him for a few
hours--that's all!
"Well, when the feeling had come back into my limbs a bit, and I could
move them without screaming, the girl produced some food and drink, and,
although I don't in the least know what they were, I ate and drank
freely. Then, in the curious `pidgin' lingo that these people use when
conversing with white men, the girl gave me to understand that my life
and that of the skipper was in the greatest jeopardy, and that if I did
not want particularly to die I must buck up and save myself and the
skipper. Then, taking command, she bade me lift the old man by the
shoulders while she took his feet; and in this fashion we slipped out of
the hut, seeing nobody, and made our way slowly through the wood until
we emerged upon a little beach just on the other side of that headland.
Then she drew out from among the bushes a small canoe, in the bottom of
which she helped me to place the skipper; after which, with a warning to
me to be exceedingly careful and to make no noise, she handed me a
paddle, thrust the canoe afloat, and vanished. And--and--well, that's
all! And now you may as well pitch me the yarn of your share of the
night's doings. If one may venture to judge by appearances you seem to
have had a fairly lively time out here."
"We have, I can assure you," said I; and then I proceeded to give
Cunningham a detailed account of all that had happened during the
absence of himself and the skipper. I had scarcely finished when the
cabin boy came up with the intimation that breakfast was ready in the
cabin, and we accordingly went below, seated ourselves, and fell to. We
did not dally long over the meal, for there was still plenty to be done
and thought about; but before returning to the deck I remarked to
Cunningham that I should like to look in and see how the skipper was
getting on, and we both entered the stateroom together. To my surprise
we found that the old chap was awake and seemingly feeling not very much
the worse for the hard knock on the head which he had received; indeed,
he wanted to turn out and dress and go on deck. But Cunningham, who had
assumed the role of surgeon, would not hear of such a thing--would not
even permit Brown to leave his bunk; so, as a compromise, I just had to
sit down and spin the whole yarn of our adventure over again to him.
The poor old fellow seemed very much cut up when he learned that we had
lost six men--all of them compatriots of his, too--and bitterly
reproached himself for having come to the island at all. Of course we
comforted him as well as we could by pointing out to him that the
happening was due not so much to want of precaution on his part as to
the exceeding guile of the natives; and then I led the conversation
round to the prisoners, and asked what he proposed to do with them.
Cunningham was for taking the law into our own hands and inflicting upon
them a salutary lesson by hanging one of them at the yardarm for each of
our people who had been murdered; but Brown would not hear of this, and
we were all three still discussing the matter when the cabin boy came
down with a message from Murdock to say that a large canoe had just been
launched from the beach and was heading for the schooner, and would I be
pleased to go on deck.
Of course I instantly obeyed the call, for my first idea was that
another attack was possibly impending; but when I got on deck I found
that the canoe, although a large one, was manned by only four natives,
who were approaching us very slowly, and apparently with a considerable
amount of trepidation, and that a large palm-leaf was conspicuously
displayed in the bows of the craft, the latter being, as I interpreted
it, intended to serve the purpose of a flag of truce. Naturally we at
once assumed our weapons, and saw that our firearms were fully loaded
and placed handy for use, lest further treachery should be contemplated;
and then I hailed the canoe and informed her occupants that if they had
anything to say to us they might approach within easy speaking distance,
but that they were not to attempt to come alongside without permission,
and that if any such attempt were made they would at once be fired upon.
And that there might be no misunderstanding upon this point I
flourished a loaded gun in their sight, to show that we were quite
prepared to carry out our threat.
Slowly and hesitatingly the canoe continued to approach the schooner
until she had arrived within about twenty fathoms of us, and then her
crew backed water and brought their craft to a standstill. A short
consultation among them next followed, and then one of their number rose
to his feet and hailed.
"Master," he shouted, "we got it three mans ashore belong you. You any
mans got it belong we?"
"Yes," replied I. "We have eight of your people on board here. Are the
white men unhurt?"
"No," was the answer. "They all get it hurt leettle bit, not much.
Black mans along you not hurt, eh?"
"Three of them are unhurt; the others are wounded so they no can walk.
What for you not bring it off those white mans with you?" I demanded,
adopting their peculiar mode of speech under the mistaken impression
that I could thus make myself the better understood.
"Those white mans no can walk too," answered my interlocutor. "Suppose
you want it them, we bring them off, and you give it us those eight
black fellows belong we, eh?"
So it was an exchange of prisoners that they had come off to negotiate,
it appeared. Well, I was more than willing to make the exchange, but I
did not care to appear too eager; so I temporised by enquiring as to the
nature and extent of the white men's hurts. But they either could not
or would not reply in a manner that was perfectly intelligible to me,
and matters seemed to be approaching a deadlock when one of the canoe
men started to his feet, and in an eager, impatient manner, asked:
"Master, suppose you no got it Oahika aboard, eh?" which enquiry went a
good way toward confirming my opinion that the rascal was a person of
some importance.
"Yes," I replied, "we got it Oahika, all right, not hurt one little
bit." Then, with some vague idea of trying the effect of a "bluff", I
continued: "He great blackguard scoundrel! He attack schooner last
night, kill it two white mans! By and by we hang Oahika up there until
he go dead!" and I pointed to the schooner's lower yardarm.
A yell of anguish immediately followed this announcement of mine, fully
confirming me in the belief that Oahika was likely to prove a valuable
asset if properly manipulated. The next moment, however, one of the men
jumped up and shouted:
"Mine no believe you got it Oahika. Suppose yes, you show it him, eh?"
"Murdock, Simpson," I shouted, "just hoist that swab Oahika up on his
feet and take him to the rail, so that those fellows in the canoe may
see him."
This was done; and the moment that the fellow's head and shoulders
appeared above the top of the schooner's low bulwark another loud howl
arose from the crew of the canoe, who incontinently flung themselves
down on their knees and began to kow-tow energetically. But they were
quickly interrupted by Oahika, who shouted angrily at them, and then, as
soon as he had secured their attention, proceeded to gabble to them a
long string of what seemed to be instructions, in a language quite
unintelligible to me. When he had finished, the occupants of the canoe
waved their hands, as if to indicate that they understood, then seized
their paddles and began to sweep the canoe's head round toward the
shore. This sudden change of front rather puzzled me. I did not quite
know what to make of it; it might mean anything, I thought, and among
other things it might mean that Oahika had given instructions to muster
every available fighting man in the village--or the island--and renew
the attack upon the schooner. So I hailed the hastily departing canoe:
"Hillo, there, canoe ahoy! Where are you going, and what are you about
to do?"
The men ceased paddling for a moment, and one of them flourished his
hand toward the island.
"We get it back along ashore plenty quick and bring it them three mans
belong you. Then you give it us Oahika, eh?" he announced.
"You bring the three white mans, and then we'll see," I retorted.
"And--listen you--if you bring any more of your own men with you I shall
shoot Oahika dead! Sabby?"
This threat, uttered upon the spur of the moment, seemed to disconcert
them very decidedly, for they remained inactive, staring each other in
the face. It also seemed to disconcert Oahika; for no sooner had I
finished speaking than he began to shout a long string of further
directions, to which the canoe men replied from time to time by waving
their hands. Finally Oahika brought his communication to an end with a
few words which, from the intonation of his voice, might have been an
injunction to the men to hurry up; and away the canoe sped toward the
shore.
As soon as it had gone I went down below and reported to the skipper,
who now seemed to be not quite so well as he had been half an hour
earlier. He was, naturally, very pleased to learn that the three men
whom we had all believed to be dead were still alive; and he instructed
me to make the best terms I could for their ransom, and, as soon as I
had secured possession of them and the boat, to get the schooner under
way and proceed to sea without further delay.
The canoe had been gone about three-quarters of an hour when, watching
the shore through the ship's telescope, I perceived a slight stir upon
the beach, and presently became aware that a small party of natives had
gathered about the jollyboat, which they pushed off from the beach,
making fast her painter to the stern of the canoe. Then other natives
appeared, bearing in grass hammocks the three missing seamen, who were
laid in the sternsheets of the jollyboat; and finally the canoe was
manned, apparently by the same four natives who had previously come off
in her, and headed for the schooner, whereupon I gave orders for the
windlass to be manned and the cable to be hove short, all ready for
tripping the anchor at a moment's notice. This was done; and by the
time the canoe was once more within hailing distance the cable was so
taut up and down that a single additional revolution of the windlass
barrel would break out the anchor and free us from the ground.
And now came the really difficult part of my negotiation with the
savages; for, being themselves superlatively unscrupulous and deceitful,
they naturally suspected us of being the same, and would not come
alongside, or render up possession of the jollyboat and the three
wounded seamen whom she carried, until we on our part had released
Oahika. And this I flatly refused to do, feeling that, as likely as
not, they would play us some scurvy trick as soon as they had recovered
possession of the man who, I now very strongly suspected, was the
paramount chief of the island, or, if not that, at least a chief of very
considerable importance. We argued, stipulated, and made counter
stipulations, all to no purpose, and finally once more arrived at a
deadlock. Of course I might very easily have settled the matter by
shooting the four natives in the canoe; but that would have been an act
of the very blackest treachery, and I was strongly of opinion that it
was just such treacherous conduct on the part of certain unscrupulous
white men that had made the natives of some of the Polynesian islands
the cruel, treacherous wretches that they had become.
I therefore once more resorted to "bluff", by hailing them and saying
that unless they came alongside at once and surrendered possession of
the boat and those in her, I would get the schooner under way and
proceed to sea, taking Oahika and the rest of our prisoners with me; and
to make my threat the more effective I turned away and gave the order to
man the windlass. This was enough; with the first clank of the windlass
pawls, Oahika, who had thus far taken no part in our second palaver, let
out a yell at the men in the canoe which caused them to surrender
instantly at discretion and rush their craft up alongside the schooner.
And now I determined upon a bold thing. These Roua Poua savages had
caused us a vast amount of trouble and loss; through them we were
short-handed to the extent of no less than six men; and I felt that for
the sake of my own satisfaction and self-respect I must get something,
though it were ever so little, back out of them. Therefore, since we
white men were all armed, and therefore in a position to take good care
of ourselves, as soon as the tackles were hooked into the jollyboat's
ringbolts I ordered the four savages in the canoe to leave her and come
on deck to help to hoist in the boat; and this they did in a state of
the most abject fear and trembling. Then I sent them for'ard to the
windlass to assist in breaking out the anchor; and it was not until the
schooner was actually adrift that I permitted them to begin the transfer
of their wounded from the _Martha's_ deck to the canoe. They displayed
remarkably little consideration for the comfort and wellbeing of their
comrades in the performance of this duty; and indeed I have always been
of opinion that had I been foolish enough to liberate Oahika before the
others had been transhipped, he and his canoemen would have
incontinently made off at top speed for the shore, leaving the others,
sound and wounded alike, upon our hands and at our mercy. But I was
careful to keep Oahika until the last, and it was not until the schooner
was fairly under way and heading out to sea that I cast him adrift and
permitted him to go over the side, which he did in a splutter of mingled
wrath and fear, pouring out a long string of what were probably native
curses as he seized the steering paddle and violently thrust the canoe
off the schooner's side.
By midday we were bowling merrily away to the westward under every rag
that we could set, and Roua Poua had sunk out of sight beneath the
eastern horizon. Long before this, however--in fact, the moment that
they were safely aboard and comfortably bestowed in their bunks--
Cunningham had taken the three wounded seamen in hand; and when he had
done all that he could for them he came up on deck and reported to me.
"I am afraid," he said, "that there is not much hope for those three,"
with a jerk of his thumb in the direction of the forecastle. "Sullivan
and Halpin have had their skulls cracked by blows inflicted with a war
club, and their cases are very similar to that of the skipper, but
worse; while poor Glenn has no less than eleven spear wounds in his
body, and though none of them is very serious in itself this heat makes
me terribly afraid of gangrene. However, I have done all that I can for
them at present, and we must just hope for the best. Glenn tells me
that after the skipper and I had left them the natives came swarming
round them, exciting their curiosity by exhibiting curios of various
kinds for sale, or barter, rather, at ridiculously cheap prices, and so
enticing them away from the beach toward the village, where, they were
informed, some really valuable articles might be seen. And then, when
they arrived at the village, they were suddenly set upon before they had
time to draw their weapons, overpowered, and confined in a hut, where
they were left all day yesterday and all last night without food or
water, and with their injuries untended. I am afraid there is not much
hope for them, poor fellows!"
This was bad news--so very bad, indeed, that I felt it my duty to go
forthwith to the skipper, report the matter to him, and ask for
instructions; my own idea being that we ought to head for the Samoa or
Tonga group, and procure properly qualified medical assistance with as
little delay as possible.
But when I got down below and began to talk to the Old Man I soon found
that he was, for some inscrutable reason, utterly opposed to any such
idea. He would not give his reasons, but he positively forbade me to do
as I had suggested, instructing me instead to work out a Great Circle
track to Canton, and to get the ship upon her proper course at once.
And as he seemed to be in full possession of all his faculties, and to
know quite well what he was talking about, I had no alternative but to
obey. And indeed, so far as saving the three men in the forecastle was
concerned, we might as well have been heading for Canton as anywhere
else; for Halpin and Glenn died within a couple of hours of each other
that same night, while Sullivan lingered only some twenty-six hours
longer.
I looked forward to a speedy and pleasant run to Canton, for I reckoned
upon carrying the Trades with us practically all the way. But we were
unfortunate; for after a fine run of nine days to the northward and
westward we ran into the belt of equatorial calms in latitude 4 degrees
South, and for fully three weeks thereafter encountered such
extraordinary weather that we dared not ship our fins, from fear of
having them carried away, or of badly straining the schooner. For
instead of the long spell of calms which one usually expects in those
latitudes the quiet weather generally lasted but an hour or two, and
then was succeeded by such furious squalls that, for the most part, we
could do nothing but run before them under bare poles; and perhaps the
most exasperating part of it all was that these squalls blew mostly from
the westward, or nearly dead in our teeth, so that it was only toward
the tail end of them, just when they were dying out, that we were able
to bring the little hooker to the wind for half an hour or so, and make
a few miles of northing. And when it was not blowing with hurricane
strength it was usually just the opposite: a flat calm, with a black,
lowering, overcast sky, moist, steamy, overpowering heat, heavy storms
of thunder and lightning, torrential downpours of tepid rain--which, by
the way, enabled us to re-fill all our water tanks and casks--and
waterspouts _ad libitum_ constantly threatening us with destruction.
It was a month, to a day, from the date of our departure from Roua Poua
when we at length cleared the calm belt and got the first breath of the
north-east Trades in latitude 3 degrees 47 minutes North, and longitude
158 degrees 55 minutes West, having been driven back almost as far east
as Christmas Island by the baffling winds and furious squalls with which
we had been obliged to contend; and this brought the dangerous Marshall
group right athwart our track. Therefore, the poor old skipper being
still unwell, and quite unfit for duty, I decided to make a good stretch
to the northward--say as far as latitude 10 degrees North--before
bearing up for Canton; by doing which I should have a clear sea before
me for the remainder of the trip.
I have spoken of the skipper as being unwell and quite unfit for duty;
but that scarcely conveys a correct impression of his condition. The
fact was that he was well enough to be up and about on deck, but he was
constantly worried with headache of the most distracting kind, and, what
was still worse, his intellect seemed to be failing him: he suffered
from frequent total lapses of memory, stopping short in the midst of a
conversation simply because he forgot in a moment what he was talking
about; and he was subject, from time to time, to hallucinations, when he
would assure us, with the utmost gravity, that he was the King of
England taking a holiday "incognito", the re-incarnation of Morgan the
pirate, or something else equally ridiculous, while at other times he
would be perfectly rational. For the first two or three weeks, while
these symptoms were in process of development, he caused Cunningham and
me a very considerable amount of anxiety, for we were constantly
dreading some new departure which would render him dangerous either to
himself or to others; but at length, as we were unable to detect any
such tendency, we grew easier in our minds, just allowing him to wander
about the ship at his own sweet will, and amuse himself by giving the
most extraordinary orders, which nobody ever even pretended to carry
out. We came to the conclusion that he was suffering from some obscure
form of concussion of the brain, from which we hoped he might be
relieved upon our arrival at Hong-Kong, where we expected to obtain
efficient surgical assistance; but that, meanwhile, he was in no very
serious danger. As the event proved, however, we were all woefully
mistaken. We had made as much northing as I deemed necessary, and were
bowling along upon a west-nor'-west course, reeling off our ten knots
per hour, with all our flying kites abroad and a fine north-east breeze
over our starboard quarter, when, about four bells in the first; watch,
the skipper came up on deck complaining that he found it impossible to
sleep in consequence of the extreme heat of his cabin. The night was
brilliantly starlit, and the air so clear that we could have easily
distinguished a sail at a distance of two miles, had there been owe to
see; but the light was not strong enough to enable me clearly to
distinguish Brown's features, even when he was standing beside me, while
the cabin lamp was turned low, so that there was not much light coming
through the skylight. But when the old fellow fell into step by my
side, and began to talk quite rationally about the heat below, the
impossibility of sleeping, and his gratification at the fine breeze
which we had fallen in with, and so on, I was completely thrown off my
guard; for he appeared to be in precisely the condition that I had often
previously seen him in, when he had talked rationally enough for a time,
taken a little walk--as he was doing at that moment--and then, suddenly
forgetting what he was conversing about, gone below and slept for
several hours.
All at once, as we were walking to and fro between the main rigging and
the wheel grating, the old fellow halted, pulled off his cap, extracted
a big bandana handkerchief from it, and proceeded to mop his head and
face, from which--as in my own case--the perspiration was freely
pouring.
"Great snakes," he ejaculated, "but it is hot, and no mistake! The
sweat's pourin' out o' me like water outen a sponge. I guess that's
what's makin' me so all-fired thirsty. Where's the water cask? I'm
boun' to have a drink. My tongue's so dry it's rattlin' agin my teeth!
Can't ye hear it? Where's that there scuttle butt, I say?"
"Better not drink direct from the cask, sir," I said, for Cunningham had
strongly urged us all to drink nothing but filtered water, and even that
with a dash of lime juice in it, during the extreme heat. "The filter
stands on the sideboard, and there is an opened bottle of lime juice in
the rack above it; you will find that very much cooler and more
refreshing than the water from the scuttle butt. That stuff is really
not fit to drink."
"But I'm so tarnation thirsty that I must have a drink," he insisted,
"and I'd rather drink outer the cask than go below. Why, man alive,
that there cabin is like a oven!"
"Oh," said I, glancing hastily round and noting that the weather seemed
fine and settled, "if that is all I'll very soon slip down and fetch you
up a drink! Bring yourself to an anchor here on the wheel grating, sir,
while I go below. I'll be back in a brace of shakes. Just keep your
eye on him, Chips," I whispered to the carpenter, who was at the wheel.
"I'll not be gone more than half a minute."
"Right you are, sir," responded the carpenter, turning his quid in his
mouth as the skipper obediently seated himself on the wheel grating,
while I made a rush for the companion. I turned up the cabin lamp,
procured a tumbler, and was in the act of measuring out a liberal dose
of lime juice when I heard the carpenter's voice suddenly upraised in
accents of panic.
"Man overboard! Man overboard!!" he shouted. "Mr Temple, come on
deck, sir; the skipper's been and throwed hisself over the lee rail!"
Flinging down the tumbler and bottle of lime juice, I mounted the
companion ladder in two jumps, nearly dashing my brains out against the
slide in my haste, and stared stupidly about me for a moment, being more
than half-stunned. Then, as I pulled myself together, I heard Chips
repeating, parrot-wise:
"He just laid his han's upon the rail and swung hisself clean overboard,
like a boy jumpin' a gate."
"Down helm, man; down helm and round her to!" I roared. And rushing to
the main rigging I let go the lee braces and began to drag frantically
upon the weather ones in an ineffectual effort to back the topsail.
Then I remembered that the weather studdingsails were set, being
reminded thereof, in fact, by the snapping of the topmast
studdingsail-boom, as the schooner, with her helm hard a-lee, rushed
furiously up into the wind, and her topgallantsail, topsail, and
squaresail flew aback, and the broken spar began to thresh spitefully
against the fore rigging in the fresh breeze. I saw at once that I had
made a mess of things to no purpose, and also stood to make a far worse
mess of them if I was not careful; for the amount of sail which the
schooner could carry while running off the wind was altogether too much
for her when brought to, and she was now lying over with her lee rail
buried, with the possibility that her masts might go over the side at
any moment if she were not relieved in one way or another. As for
saving the skipper, that was impossible: for--as I had forgotten for the
moment--we were now, owing to the loss of six of our foremast men,
short-handed, and we could not possibly launch a boat until the schooner
was snugged down; and by the time we had done that we should be miles
away from the spot where the skipper had gone overboard, without any
certain, definite knowledge as to the precise direction in which to look
for him. Therefore, all these circumstances coming to my mind in a
flash, I jumped to the wheel and helped Chips to put it hard up again,
luckily managing to get the little hooker before the wind once more with
no further damage than the loss of a studdingsail-boom and the splitting
of the lower studdingsail.