Sheldon did not mention the subject again, nor did his conduct change
from what it had always been. There was nothing of the pining lover, nor
of the lover at all, in his demeanour. Nor was there any awkwardness
between them. They were as frank and friendly in their relations as
ever. He had wondered if his belligerent love declaration might have
aroused some womanly self-consciousness in Joan, but he looked in vain
for any sign of it. She appeared as unchanged as he; and while he knew
that he hid his real feelings, he was firm in his belief that she hid
nothing. And yet the germ he had implanted must be at work; he was
confident of that, though he was without confidence as to the result.
There was no forecasting this strange girl's processes. She might
awaken, it was true; and on the other hand, and with equal chance, he
might be the wrong man for her, and his declaration of love might only
more firmly set her in her views on single blessedness.
While he devoted more and more of his time to the plantation itself, she
took over the house and its multitudinous affairs; and she took hold
firmly, in sailor fashion, revolutionizing the system and discipline. The
labour situation on Berande was improving. The _Martha_ had carried away
fifty of the blacks whose time was up, and they had been among the worst
on the plantation--five-year men recruited by Billy Be-blowed, men who
had gone through the old days of terrorism when the original owners of
Berande had been driven away. The new recruits, being broken in under
the new regime, gave better promise. Joan had joined with Sheldon from
the start in the programme that they must be gripped with the strong
hand, and at the same time be treated with absolute justice, if they were
to escape being contaminated by the older boys that still remained.
"I think it would be a good idea to put all the gangs at work close to
the house this afternoon," she announced one day at breakfast. "I've
cleaned up the house, and you ought to clean up the barracks. There is
too much stealing going on."
"A good idea," Sheldon agreed. "Their boxes should be searched. I've
just missed a couple of shirts, and my best toothbrush is gone."
"And two boxes of my cartridges," she added, "to say nothing of
handkerchiefs, towels, sheets, and my best pair of slippers. But what
they want with your toothbrush is more than I can imagine. They'll be
stealing the billiard balls next."
"One did disappear a few weeks before you came," Sheldon laughed. "We'll
search the boxes this afternoon."
And a busy afternoon it was. Joan and Sheldon, both armed, went through
the barracks, house by house, the boss-boys assisting, and half a dozen
messengers, in relay, shouting along the line the names of the boys
wanted. Each boy brought the key to his particular box, and was
permitted to look on while the contents were overhauled by the boss-boys.
A wealth of loot was recovered. There were fully a dozen cane-knives--big
hacking weapons with razor-edges, capable of decapitating a man at a
stroke. Towels, sheets, shirts, and slippers, along with toothbrushes,
wisp-brooms, soap, the missing billiard ball, and all the lost and
forgotten trifles of many months, came to light. But most astonishing
was the quantity of ammunition-cartridges for Lee-Metfords, for
Winchesters and Marlins, for revolvers from thirty-two calibre to forty-
five, shot-gun cartridges, Joan's two boxes of thirty-eight, cartridges
of prodigious bore for the ancient Sniders of Malaita, flasks of black
powder, sticks of dynamite, yards of fuse, and boxes of detonators. But
the great find was in the house occupied by Gogoomy and five Port Adams
recruits. The fact that the boxes yielded nothing excited Sheldon's
suspicions, and he gave orders to dig up the earthen floor. Wrapped in
matting, well oiled, free from rust, and brand new, two Winchesters were
first unearthed. Sheldon did not recognize them. They had not come from
Berande; neither had the forty flasks of black powder found under the
corner-post of the house; and while he could not be sure, he could
remember no loss of eight boxes of detonators. A big Colt's revolver he
recognized as Hughie Drummond's; while Joan identified a thirty-two Ivor
and Johnson as a loss reported by Matapuu the first week he landed at
Berande. The absence of any cartridges made Sheldon persist in the
digging up of the floor, and a fifty-pound flour tin was his reward. With
glowering eyes Gogoomy looked on while Sheldon took from the tin a
hundred rounds each for the two Winchesters and fully as many rounds more
of nondescript cartridges of all sorts and makes and calibres.
The contraband and stolen property was piled in assorted heaps on the
back veranda of the bungalow. A few paces from the bottom of the steps
were grouped the forty-odd culprits, with behind them, in solid array,
the several hundred blacks of the plantation. At the head of the steps
Joan and Sheldon were seated, while on the steps stood the gang-bosses.
One by one the culprits were called up and examined. Nothing definite
could be extracted from them. They lied transparently, but persistently,
and when caught in one lie explained it away with half a dozen others.
One boy complacently announced that he had found eleven sticks of
dynamite on the beach. Matapuu's revolver, found in the box of one Kapu,
was explained away by that boy as having been given to him by Lervumie.
Lervumie, called forth to testify, said he had got it from Noni; Noni had
got it from Sulefatoi; Sulefatoi from Choka; Choka from Ngava; and Ngava
completed the circle by stating that it had been given to him by Kapu.
Kapu, thus doubly damned, calmly gave full details of how it had been
given to him by Lervumie; and Lervumie, with equal wealth of detail, told
how he had received it from Noni; and from Noni to Sulefatoi it went on
around the circle again.
Divers articles were traced indubitably to the house-boys, each of whom
steadfastly proclaimed his own innocence and cast doubts on his fellows.
The boy with the billiard ball said that he had never seen it in his life
before, and hazarded the suggestion that it had got into his box through
some mysterious and occultly evil agency. So far as he was concerned it
might have dropped down from heaven for all he knew how it got there. To
the cooks and boats'-crews of every vessel that had dropped anchor off
Berande in the past several years were ascribed the arrival of scores of
the stolen articles and of the major portion of the ammunition. There
was no tracing the truth in any of it, though it was without doubt that
the unidentified weapons and unfamiliar cartridges had come ashore off
visiting craft.
"Look at it," Sheldon said to Joan. "We've been sleeping over a volcano.
They ought to be whipped--"
"No whip me," Gogoomy cried out from below. "Father belong me big fella
chief. Me whip, too much trouble along you, close up, my word."
"What name you fella Gogoomy!" Sheldon shouted. "I knock seven bells out
of you. Here, you Kwaque, put 'm irons along that fella Gogoomy."
Kwaque, a strapping gang-boss, plucked Gogoomy from out of his following,
and, helped by the other gang-bosses; twisted his arms behind him and
snapped on the heavy handcuffs.
"Me finish along you, close up, you die altogether," Gogoomy, with wrath-
distorted face, threatened the boss-boy.
"Please, no whipping," Joan said in a low voice. "If whipping _is_
necessary, send them to Tulagi and let the Government do it. Give them
their choice between a fine or an official whipping."
Sheldon nodded and stood up, facing the blacks.
"Manonmie!" he called.
Manonmie stood forth and waited.
"You fella boy bad fella too much," Sheldon charged. "You steal 'm
plenty. You steal 'm one fella towel, one fella cane-knife, two-ten
fella cartridge. My word, plenty bad fella steal 'm you. Me cross along
you too much. S'pose you like 'm, me take 'm one fella pound along you
in big book. S'pose you no like 'm me take 'm one fella pound, then me
send you fella along Tulagi catch 'm one strong fella government
whipping. Plenty New Georgia boys, plenty Ysabel boys stop along jail
along Tulagi. Them fella no like Malaita boys little bit. My word, they
give 'm you strong fella whipping. What you say?"
"You take 'm one fella pound along me," was the answer.
And Manonmie, patently relieved, stepped back, while Sheldon entered the
fine in the plantation labour journal.
Boy after boy, he called the offenders out and gave them their choice;
and, boy by boy, each one elected to pay the fine imposed. Some fines
were as low as several shillings; while in the more serious cases, such
as thefts of guns and ammunition, the fines were correspondingly heavy.
Gogoomy and his five tribesmen were fined three pounds each, and at
Gogoomy's guttural command they refused to pay.
"S'pose you go along Tulagi," Sheldon warned him, "you catch 'm strong
fella whipping and you stop along jail three fella year. Mr. Burnett, he
look 'm along Winchester, look 'm along cartridge, look 'm along
revolver, look 'm along black powder, look 'm along dynamite--my word, he
cross too much, he give you three fella year along jail. S'pose you no
like 'm pay three fella pound you stop along jail. Savvee?"
Gogoomy wavered.
"It's true--that's what Burnett would give them," Sheldon said in an
aside to Joan.
"You take 'm three fella pound along me," Gogoomy muttered, at the same
time scowling his hatred at Sheldon, and transferring half the scowl to
Joan and Kwaque. "Me finish along you, you catch 'm big fella trouble,
my word. Father belong me big fella chief along Port Adams."
"That will do," Sheldon warned him. "You shut mouth belong you."
"Me no fright," the son of a chief retorted, by his insolence increasing
his stature in the eyes of his fellows.
"Lock him up for to-night," Sheldon said to Kwaque. "Sun he come up put
'm that fella and five fella belong him along grass-cutting. Savvee?"
Kwaque grinned.
"Me savvee," he said. "Cut 'm grass, _ngari-ngari_ {4} stop 'm along
grass. My word!"
"There will be trouble with Gogoomy yet," Sheldon said to Joan, as the
boss-boys marshalled their gangs and led them away to their work. "Keep
an eye on him. Be careful when you are riding alone on the plantation.
The loss of those Winchesters and all that ammunition has hit him harder
than your cuffing did. He is dead-ripe for mischief."