“They are some of the king's fisherfolk,” said Tepi, scanning them
closely; “that is their village, Only fishermen and two of the king's
pilots live here. I have heard them spoken of many times.”
“Then they are just the very fellows we want,” I said to Lucia; “there's
enough of them, with us, to put the boat off this ledge into the water
again. They'll be here in a few minutes. Niàbon, do you think we can be
seen from the king's village? I can see the houses there quite plainly.”
“I fear so, Simi,” she replied.
“Then we must make these fellows who are coming to us work hard. I'll
pay them well for it if they get us afloat again in another hour. Let me
do all the talking. Take my glasses and let me know the moment you see
a boat coming. We must not be caught here like this; and the tide won't
turn for another hour at least.”
There were eleven natives, and when they were close to I noticed with
satisfaction that most of them were sturdy, well-built fellows. They
came up to us, and we all shook hands, and before even asking them to
help me, I inquired if they would like some grog to dry their skins.
Lucia had a quart bottle of Hollands all ready, and in less than five
minutes it was empty, and our visitors said I was a noble-minded and
thoughtful man.
“Friends,” I said, “behold me and my friends--and this our boat cast
upon the reef like a stranded porpoise. Wilt help us float again, so
that we may get to the king's town to-night and sleep in peace? And
I shall pay every man twenty sticks of rich, sweet tobacco and four
bottles of grog between thee.”
My munificent offer was received with acclamation, though at first they
wanted a preliminary smoke and gossip, but I bade them hurry.
“No time have we for talk now, friends,” I said, jocularly slapping one
of them on his brawny shoulders; “'tis but this morning the king sent
a white man to me in his own boat to bid me welcome; and, as we hurried
down the lagoon, that devil's rain sent me astray, so that the boat was
caught in the current and swept down into the passage, where we struck,
as thou seest.”
My explanation was quite satisfactory, and they went to work with a
will, lightening the boat--after a first and fruitless attempt to move
her--by taking out all our water, stores, &c. We were but fifty or sixty
feet away from the edge of the channel; and in half an hour, by our
united effort, had dragged her half the distance, when Niâbon beckoned
me to her.
“There are two boats half-way down the lagoon,” she said in a low voice:
“one is that of Tully, and they are using both sails and oars. See, they
are plainly in sight.”
I jumped back again amongst the natives. I knew that they would have
already seen the coming boats had they not been toiling so hard, so I
called to Niâbon to open another bottle of grog and serve it out.
“Hurry, hurry, O strong men,” I cried, as we moved the boat another foot
astern, “else shall I be laughed at by the king's white men, for two
boats are coming. And instead of twenty it shall be forty sticks of
tobacco each if ye get this boat in the water before the king's men are
here to laugh at me.”
The poor beggars were working like Trojans, their naked bodies streaming
with perspiration, as Niâbon held out to each of them half a pannikinful
of raw gin, which was tossed off at one swallow. Then both she and
Lucia, who was now on the reef, began digging the promised tobacco out
of a case with sheath knives.
“Don't bother to count the sticks!” I cried, as the boat made a sudden
move and was kept going for nearly a dozen feet. “Toss out about half of
the case and be ready to jump on board and get under cover.”
At last, with a yell of satisfaction from the natives, the stern post
was seen to be over the ledge of the coral, and then with one final
effort the boat went into the water with a splash like a sperm whale
“breaching.”
“Now, in with everything,” I shouted to Tematau, as one glance showed
me the two boats, now less than half a mile away, coming along at what
seemed to me to be infernal speed.
Tematau and the natives made a rush at the boxes of stores, bundles of
sails, water breakers, and everything else, and tumbled them on board
anyhow, Lucia and Niâbon taking the lighter articles from them and
dropping them into the cabin, so as to give us more deck room, whilst I
ran up the jib, and big Tepi the mainsail.
“Take all the loose tobacco there, my friends,” cried Niâbon to the
fishermen, who with panting bosoms stood looking at us as if we had all
gone mad, “and here are the four bottles of _rom_.”
One of them sprang to the side of the boat just as I, feeling every
moment that I should drop with exhaustion, pushed her off with an oar
into deep water. And then we heard a chorus of yells and cries from the
two boats, as we eased off the jib and main sheets, and Niâbon put her
before the wind. Then _crack! crack!_ and two bullets went through the
mainsail just below the peak, and I heard Tolly's voice shouting to me
to bring to again.
“Come aft here, you two,” I cried to Tepi and his mate; “get out the
guns, quick. Sit down in the cabin and fire, one on each side of me.”
I did not speak a moment too soon, for the leading boat suddenly lowered
her sail, took in all her oars but two, and began firing at us at less
than three hundred yards, and every bullet hit us somewhere, either in
the hull or aloft. Then they took to their oars again, and I saw that
unless we could knock some of them over she--and those in the second
boat as well--would be aboard of us in a few minutes, for there was now
but little wind and the strength of the ebb tide was fast slackening.
Tematau and Tepi each fired two or three shots in quick succession, but
missed, and then a very heavy bullet struck the side of the coaming of
the steering-well in which I was seated, glanced off and ploughed
along the deck, and the second boat now began firing into us with
breechloading rifles of some sort.
“Let me try,” I said to Tematau, clambering out of the well into the
cabin. “Go and steer, but sit down on the bottom, or you'll be hit.”
Niâbon handed me my Evans' rifle in the very nick of time, for at that
moment Tully stood up in the stern sheets of his boat and, giving the
steer oar to a native, began to take pot shots at Tepi and myself. I
waited until my hand was a bit steady, and then down he went headlong
amongst his crew. I knew I could not possibly have missed him at such a
short distance.
[Illustration: I waited until my hand was a bit steady 166]
“Good!” cried Niâbon exultingly, as both Tepi and myself fired together
and three of the native paddlers who were sitting facing us, rolled over
off their seats, either dead or badly wounded, for in an instant the
utmost confusion prevailed, some of the crew evidently wanting to come
on, and the others preventing them. By this time the first boat was
within easy pistol range the other, which was much larger and crowded
with natives, being about forty yards astern of her, but coming along
as hard as she could, two of her crew in the bows firing at us with a
disgusting kind of a foreign army rifle, whose conical bullets were half
as big as pigeon's eggs, and made a deuce of a noise, either when they
hit the _Lucia_, or went by with a sort of a groanlike hum.
“Take this,” I said to Niâbon, giving her my Deane and Adams pistol,
“and do you and Tepi keep off those in the nearest boat if they come on
again.”
But she waved it aside, and seizing Tematau's carbine, stood up and sent
her first shot crashing through the timbers of the boat.
“Quick, Tematau,” I cried, “get another rifle and fire with me at the
second boat. Let ours come to the wind--it matters not.”
Picking out one of the two fellows who were shooting so steadily at us
from the bows of their boat, I fired and missed, but another shot did
for him, for he fell backwards and I saw his rifle fly up in the air and
then drop overboard.
This was enough for them, for the steersman at once began to slew her
round, and then he too went down as a bullet from Tematau took him fair
and square in the chest, and we saw the blood pouring from him as he
fell across the gunwale. In another ten seconds they were paddling away
from us, leaving the other boat to her fate.
“That is enough,” I cried to Tepi, who I now noticed for the first
time was bleeding from a bullet wound in the left arm, which had been
hurriedly tied up by Lucia, “that is enough. Put down your gun. There is
now no one in the second boat shooting at us.”
“They are lying down in the bottom,” said Niâbon, “we can see them
moving, but some have dived overboard, and swum ashore. See, there are
four of them running along the reef.”
“Let them go, Niâbon,” and then I turned to Lucia. She was deathly pale,
but had all her wits about her, for although she could barely speak from
excitement, she had some brandy and water ready for us.
“Thank you,” I said, as I poured a stiff dose into the pannikin, and
taking first pull, passed it on to Tepi and the other man. “Now we must
have a look at that boat. We can't leave wounded men to drown.”
The wind was now very light, but the boat was so near that we were
soon alongside and looking into her. There were three dead, two badly
wounded, one slightly wounded man, and one unhurt man in her. The latter
looked at us without the slightest fear, even when Tepi, picking up a
carbine, thrust the muzzle of it almost into his face. Niâbon gently
took the weapon from Tepi's hand, laid it down and waited for me to
question our prisoner.
“Is the white man dead?” I asked.
“Ay, he died but now. The bullet went in at where the ribs join.”
To make sure that Tally was really dead I got down into the boat. He
was lying on his face and was dead enough, though he had evidently lived
until a few minutes previously.
I jumped on board the _Lucia_ again, and looked anxiously around. There
was still a light air, but the tide was now setting in, and I did not
want our boat to be carried back into the lagoon again. Then I turned to
the prisoner, and asked him if he could tell me why he ought not to be
shot. He made a gesture of utter indifference, and said he didn't care.
Did I think he was a coward, he asked? Could he not have swum ashore?
The king would kill him to-morrow.
Pitying the poor wretch, I gave him a pipe, tobacco, and matches, and
told him to help my men put the dead and wounded men on the reef, as
I wanted the boat. The people at the fishing village, who had been
watching the fight throughout from a safe distance, were within sight,
so telling the prisoner he must go to them and get them to carry their
dead and wounded up to the houses before the tide covered the reef
again, I sent him off with Tematau, Tepi, and Niâbon. Their gruesome
task was soon done, and the boat rid of her ensanguined cargo; then as
soon as she came alongside again, I called Niâbon on board, and telling
her to steer, went into the smaller boat and took the _Lucia_ in tow.
As we slowly crept out through the passage, we saw the fisher folk come
down to the reef, and, lifting up the three dead men, carry them away,
others following with the wounded. It was not a pleasant sight to see,
nor even to think of, now that it was all over, and so we none of us
spoke as we tugged at the oars.
We got outside at last, and then ceased towing, as a light air carried
us well clear of the outer reef. Coming alongside, we stepped on board,
after having pulled out the boat's plug. Then we watched her drift
astern to fill.
At dawn when I was awakened, after a good four hours' sleep, Apamama was
thirty miles astern of us, and we were running free before a nice cool
breeze, steering N.W. for Kusaie Island, the eastern outlier of the
Carolines, eight hundred miles away.
The two women had not heard me move, and were both sound asleep, their
faces close together and their arms intertwined.