At seven o’clock the following morning Dan Pritchard was awakened from a
light and fitful slumber by forceful hammering at his bedroom door. To
his query, “Yes, yes, who is it?” a voice freighted with tears and
fright answered:
“’Tis Julia, sor. Miss Tammy’s gone, God help us.”
“Gone? Gone? Gone where?”
“Sorra wan o’ me knows, but she’s not in the house and her bed has not
been shlept in. I found a letther for you, sor, on her bureau.” And
Julia opened his door an inch and slid an envelope in to him. He read:
Beloved:
I was very foolish to think you truly loved me, to think that I,
a half-caste Polynesian girl, could make you love me as I desire
to be loved. Therefore, I leave you, though I love you. Because
I love you, last night I offered you all that I have. You needed
it, but—you could not accept it from me because that would have
made you feel that you must accept me also. I have been shamed.
I am not a woman of common blood, yet you refused from me what
you gladly accepted from your Chinese servant. So I have learned
my lesson. I am not angry, dear one, but I am beginning to
understand Mellenger was right. Your world is not for me. Please
tell Mellenger that I forgive him and that I am sorry I spoke
certain words to him, for he is both wise and brave and a loyal
friend. Tell him I know he will forgive me, and why.
I have begged of Sooey Wan five hundred dollars. Please repay
him. As for the money my father gave me, I leave it to you, for
I love you. You need it and I would have you happy, even though
I may not know happiness myself. Where I go I shall never
require money.
Good-by, Dan Pritchard. Good-by to our love. Perhaps some day we
shall meet in Paliuli, for the missionaries say that there even
a half-caste girl shall be washed whiter than snow. But alas, I
have never seen snow. I know not what it is.
And now I depart from this house, with naught in my heart for
you but love.
Your
TAMEA.
Dan’s heart was constricted. For several minutes he sat dumbly on the
side of the bed, reading and rereading the letter, striving to realize
that for the second time within twelve hours his world had come tumbling
about his ears. Julia’s sniffling came to him through the slightly
opened door. The sound irritated him.
“Send Sooey Wan up to me, Julia, please,” he ordered.
“He’s here now, sor.”
“Come in, you yellow idiot,” Dan roared, and the old Chinaman shuffled
into the room and stood before him dejectedly, but with eyes that met
his master’s glance unflinchingly. “When Miss Larrieau asked you to lend
her five hundred dollars, why did you not come up and tell me
immediately?” he demanded.
“Sometime, Missa Dan,” Sooey Wan answered humbly, “evlybody klazy. Las’
night I think Sooey Wan klazy, too. After Missa Dan go bed, lady queen
knock my door. She say: ‘Sooey Wan, I likee fi’ hund’ed dolla’.’ I think
velly funny, so I say ‘Wha’ for?’ and lady queen get velly mad, so Sooey
Wan think maybe lady queen wanchee buy plesent Missa Dan, maybe likee
make suplise party. Wha’ for Sooey Wan ketchum light for ask question to
lady queen? Sooey Wan allee same cook, lady queen allee same lady boss.
No can do, Missa Dan.”
“That confounded single-track Oriental mind of yours has broken my
heart,” Dan groaned. “Sooey Wan, last night the lady queen offered to
give me a quarter of a million dollars, but I would not accept it. It
was a trust and I couldn’t take advantage of her generous nature. I
dared not risk losing her money. Her father trusted me, and I couldn’t
accept money from a woman anyhow. She knows that you offered me money,
however, and that I accepted it from you, only she doesn’t know why. She
doesn’t understand that you’re a man, Sooey Wan, that you can take a
gambler’s chance, that I’ll throw old Casson out of the business and put
you in as a silent partner; she doesn’t understand that as a baby I
acquired the habit of accepting money from you. You remember how you
would give me spending money when my father wouldn’t? You old fool,
you’ve spoiled me, but you love me like a son and—well, Sooey Wan,
you’re not a Chinaman to me—a servant. You’re my friend—the whitest
white man and the truest friend I’ve ever known, God bless you—but oh,
I could kill you this morning! You’re such a lovable, loyal old booby,
and because of you the girl has gone. She thinks now that I do not want
her.”
“Women,” said Sooey Wan, “all klazy.”
“I haven’t the slightest idea where the girl could have gone.”
“I think maybe go back same place lady queen come from,” the crafty
Chinaman suggested. “Maybe ketchum steamer today. I think velly good job
talkee policeeman, policeeman ketchum velly quick. If lady queen no come
back Sooey Wan shootum blains”—and he struck fiercely his bony, yellow
temple.
“I have an idea, Sooey Wan. Last Sunday morning we walked along the
waterfront together. I had a schooner in from the south and I wanted to
talk to the captain. At Pacific Street bulkhead there was a trading
schooner, the Pelorus, unloading copra, and Tamea spoke to the Kanaka
mate in his own language.”
He reached for the telephone and called up the Meiggs wharf lookout of
the Merchants’ Exchange.
“Has the schooner Pelorus sailed?” he queried, after introducing himself
as a member of the Exchange.
“Towed out with the tide about five o’clock this morning, Mr.
Pritchard.”
“What towed her out?”
“A Crowley gasoline tug, sir. Wait a minute until I get the glass on
her. She’s just coming back after dropping the Pelorus off the Gate.” A
silence. Then, “Crowley Number Thirty-four.”
“Thank you.” Dan hung up and turned to Sooey Wan. “Bring me a cup of
coffee and a piece of toast. Get Graves out and tell him to have the car
waiting in front in fifteen minutes,” he ordered, and leaped for his
shower bath. By the time he was dressed Sooey Wan appeared with the
coffee and just as Crowley tug Number Thirty-four slid into her berth to
await another towing job, Dan Pritchard appeared on the dock and hailed
her skipper in the pilot house.
“You towed the Pelorus out a couple of hours ago. Did you happen to
observe whether she carried any passengers?”
“I did. One, sir. A young lady.”
“Describe her.”
“A handsome young lady, sir, dark complected in a way, and yet not dark.
Struck me she might have just a drop of Island blood in her, sir. She
was wearin’ a blue suit but no hat, and when I saw her first as I bumped
alongside she was settin’ on the main hatch coamin’ and she’d been
cryin’.”
“Any baggage?”
“A suitcase and an accordion. The skipper of the Pelorus found her
settin’ there and she introduced herself. I gathered that he knew her
people and was glad to meet her. She must have shipped as a passenger,
because she was standin’ aft lookin’ back at the city the last I saw of
the Pelorus.”
“How fast is the fastest tug or launch in the Crowley fleet?” Dan next
inquired.
“Fifteen miles an hour.”
“Great! I’ll charter her. I want to overhaul the Pelorus and take that
girl off.”
The man in the pilot house shook his head. “No use, sir. The Pelorus has
lines like a yacht and she’s a witch in a breeze of wind. There’s a
thirty mile nor’west breeze on her quarter and she’s logging fifteen
knots if she’s logging an inch this minute. I cast her off at six
fifteen—two hours ago. She’d be hull down on the horizon in an hour.
You couldn’t hope to overhaul her, sir.”
“Thank you, friend. I dare say you’re right.” He wadded a bill into a
ball and tossed it in the pilot house window, smiled wanly and returned
to his car. On the way up to the office of Casson and Pritchard he
formulated a plan of action, which he proceeded to place in operation
the moment he found himself alone in his private office.
First he looked up the Pelorus in Lloyd’s Register and satisfied himself
that she was staunch and seaworthy, or rather that she had been a year
previous. She was owned in Honolulu. Well, Tamea would doubtless be safe
aboard her—that is, safe from the elements, although a cold feeling
swept over him as he thought of that glorious creature alone on a
trading schooner, at the mercy of her captain. He hoped the man was
different from the majority of his kind.
At nine o’clock he telephoned the Customs House and learned that the
Pelorus had cleared for general cruising in the South Pacific, with her
first port of call Tahiti. With a sinking heart Dan recalled that there
was neither wireless station nor cable station at Tahiti, and a close
scrutiny of the Shipping Guide disclosed the fact that the next steamer
for Sidney, via Tahiti, Pago Pago and Raratonga would not sail for two
weeks. Well, he would write Casson and Pritchard’s agent at Tahiti to
board the Pelorus when she dropped hook in the harbor and deliver to the
girl a letter and a draft on the French bank in Tahiti, to enable her to
purchase a first class steamer passage back to San Francisco, where they
would be married immediately. Undoubtedly the steamer would beat the
Pelorus to Tahiti, even though the latter vessel should have a two
weeks’ start. Even should the Pelorus beat her in, the schooner would
probably lie in Tahiti harbor for a week and Tamea would go ashore and
visit friends of her father’s while awaiting passage on a schooner that
could drop her off at Riva. The chances for overhauling the heart-broken
fugitive were excellent; the letter which would reach her, via the
steamer and later by hand of Casson and Pritchard’s agent, would bring
her back to him. Of that he felt assured.
However, in the event the steamer should never reach Tahiti, he essayed
two other means of communicating with her, via his agent. There was a
wireless station at Fanning Island and another at Noumea, so he sent a
message to each, with a request that it be relayed to Tamea by the first
vessels touching there and bound for Tahiti.
He had done all he could to retrieve the situation now, so he spread his
long arms out on his desk, laid his face in them and suffered. He
yearned for the blessed relief of tears, for at last Dan Pritchard was
realizing that he did indeed love Tamea with all of the wild and
passionate love of which he had dreamed. He had not believed that it
would be possible for him to love any woman so. His heart ached for her.
He was thoroughly wretched.
What matter if her mother had been a Polynesian princess, her father a
carefree, wandering love-pirate, a very Centaur? Tamea was—Tamea—and
in all this world there would never, by God’s grace, exist another like
her.
He got out her letter and read it again, and a lump gathered in his
throat as he realized how sweet it was, how benignant, how overflowing
with love and the gladness of love’s sacrifice. How prideful she was and
how childish! What a tremendous indication was her act, of a
tremendously regal character! Poor, bruised, misunderstanding and
misunderstood heart. His tears came at last. . . .
By noon he had regained control of himself, and resolutely driving from
his mind all thoughts of Tamea, he concentrated upon his business
affairs. His first move was to order the firm’s books closed as of that
date and a schedule of assets and liabilities drawn up, after which he
wrote a form letter to the firm’s customers explaining the predicament
in which Casson and Pritchard found themselves and the reason for it,
pledged his own private fortune to retrieve the situation in part and
invited the creditors to meet with him and his attorneys in the assembly
room of the Merchants’ Exchange a week hence, when a thorough and
comprehensive review of the situation would be possible and at which
time he hoped to have worked out a scheme for the rehabilitation of the
business and the payment of one hundred cents on every dollar of the
firm’s obligations.
As yet no one, not even the chief clerk, knew that Casson and Pritchard
were listed among the casualties in the post-war collapse of values
which Dan had feared so long. Dan and his partner were the sole
custodians of that cheerless information, but in their minds existed no
illusions regarding their situation. That eight thousand tons of rice
aboard the Malayan alone spelled a loss of at least a million and a
half. Already the market on coffee, sugar, Oriental oils, copra and a
hundred other commodities had commenced to slump, and, in the wild
scramble to throw trades overboard before too heavy a loss should
accrue, Dan knew that every importing and exporting house in the country
would be hard put to weather the storm. Casson and Pritchard would have
to face other losses in the natural order of business, and Dan was
shrewd enough to realize that these, coupled with the tremendous loss on
old Casson’s rice gamble, would force him to cry for quarter. Therefore
he faced the issue resolutely and calmly made his preparations for the
assault of the firm’s creditors by assuming the initiative.
For a week he worked all day and part of each night at the office. Old
Casson, cruelly stung with remorse and fright, remained at home and did
not communicate with him, a condition for which Dan was grateful. He
heard nothing from Maisie, nor did his thoughts dwell long or frequently
upon her. He had room in his harassed mind for thoughts of but one
woman—Tamea.
All during that terrible week gossip linked irremediable disaster with
some of the oldest and soundest firms on the Street. Apparently Katsuma
and Company had been smashed beyond all hope of rehabilitation, for
Katsuma, Jap-like, had solved his problem by hanging himself and was as
dead as Julius Cæsar. There was a panic in Wall Street and already local
banks had grown timid and were refusing the loans so necessary to the
successful operation of the commerce upon which banks must, perforce,
predicate their existence. Demand loans were being called, and when not
met the collateral back of them was levied upon.
At the conclusion of that week’s business Dan had before him a written
record of Casson and Pritchard’s affairs; the letters to creditors lay
on his desk, awaiting his signature, and his plan of rehabilitation,
even his address to the firm’s creditors, had been rehearsed until he
knew it by heart. At eleven o’clock on Saturday his bank called a large
loan. Over the telephone the banker informed Dan crisply but courteously
that they expected the note to be paid on Monday; whereupon Dan
Pritchard sent out his letters to Casson and Pritchard’s creditors and
then sent for Mark Mellenger, whom he had not seen since the latter’s
sudden retreat from the Italian restaurant in the Latin quarter.
“I’ve sent for you, Mel,” Dan informed his friend, “to give you two
exclusive stories, one of which is for publication. In the first place,
Tamea has returned to Riva, or at least she is now en route there. I am
endeavoring, however, to turn her back at Tahiti in order that I may
marry her.”
“Why did she leave? Did you send her away?”
Dan briefly explained and Mellenger listened in silence; at the
conclusion of Dan’s recital he merely nodded and said: “I suppose any
man would be a very great fool not to marry a woman like Tamea. She is
the only one of her kind I ever heard of. What’s the other story?”
“It’s contained in this letter to the creditors of our firm. I’m busted,
Mel. However, I shall rise, like the phenix, from my ashes, thanks to
Sooey Wan. I’ll reorganize the firm, eliminating Casson, who is in no
position to dictate terms or claim an interest for alleged good-will. I
hope he has means to enable him to take care of Mrs. Casson and Maisie,
and if he hasn’t I dare say Maisie can do something to support herself.”
“I’ll write you a nice, kindly story regarding the embarrassment of your
firm. I’ve been writing such stories for two weeks. I dislike to air
your difficulty, Dan, but if I do not the other papers will, so I might
as well scoop them in the Sunday edition. Poor Tamea! I shall probably
not see her again, but I am glad to have her friendship at least. Her
friendship is worth something.”
He accepted one of Dan’s cigars and commenced to talk of other things;
at parting he remarked, casually, that he would be up to the house for
dinner the following Thursday night—now that Tamea was no longer there
to be oppressed by his presence.