GAIN OF LOSS
With a clean bill of health, and Ha'o as supreme chief anxious to
become a nation, and therefore ready to follow the white men's ideas,
matters began to progress rapidly.
The first thing to be done, as soon as the men could be spared from
hospital work, was to get rid of the Blackbirders.
Captain Cathie, vehemently backed up by Aunt Jannet, would even now
have made short work of them.
"Give 'em a fair trial and string 'em up," was his simple idea of the
justice that would meet the case. And "Hear, hear!" said Aunt Jannet
with energy.
"I really don't think they're likely ever to come back, after the
lesson they've had this time," said Blair.
"They wouldn't if I had my way," said Cathie grimly. "Vermin like that
is best stamped out when it's under your foot."
"We stamped pretty hard last time. They'll recognise that the game is
not worth the candle."
So, in due course, the larger schooner, which was the older and poorer
found of the two, was provisioned for the voyage, and the prisoners
were brought over from the valley and put on board of her. Blair and
Stuart and Cathie awaited them there, and, through Stuart, Blair told
them very explicitly what would happen if they ever showed face in
those waters again. Then the refitted _Torch_ towed them out to the
offing, and bade them make tracks for home, and followed them with
dogged restraint for three days to see that they did it, and the island
was once more purged of contamination.
When the captain got back, Blair laughingly asked him if they had got
safely away, and Aunt Jannet eyed him with a spark of hope.
"They're gone," said Cathie, with a gloomy nod. "I'd have felt better
if they'd gone by the shorter road."
"You ought to have scuttled them, captain," said Aunt Jannet.
Then followed many busy full days. First the village was rebuilt on a
plan Blair had thought out during his hospital watches. The bush
between the hills was all cleared away and burnt on the spot, leaving
only the palms standing, and on this open space, with the shallow river
brawling through the middle, the houses were built. Stereotyped lines,
both as to design and location, were purposely avoided, and the result
was eminently pleasing. Fresh plantations of taro and bananas were
started, pawpaw trees and breadfruit were put in wherever space
offered, and a close fence across the valley kept the pigs and goats
from intruding.
The next great undertaking was the making of a decent road up to
One-Tree Pass, for the benefit of the east coast community. And at all
these works, brown men and white, Ha'o's people and the late rebels,
the atoll men, and the east coasters, high and low without exception,
toiled side by side, to the very great promotion of good feeling and
mutual understanding. The ladies, meanwhile, fostered among the women
and children all such imitative habits as were judged good for them,
and after the stress and storm the peaceful times made for growth and
enlightenment, and feelings of security and content such as Kapaa'a had
never known before.
Of direct religious teaching there was no lack, though it still ran
more to practice than to precept. Native habits and customs were
interfered with as little as possible, save wherein they palpably ran
counter to Nature's own laws and made for deterioration rather than
uplifting.
The white men held their services regularly, and made them as simple as
possible so that gleams of the light might penetrate dark hearts but by
no means dark understandings. The brown men, at their work in the
plantations, along the hillsides after the pigs and goats, and skimming
along the combers on the other side of the ridge, chanted merry hymns
whose meanings they understood not, but which did them no harm, and
were very good to hear. The women learned many things in their own
homes and in the mission houses, and the tubby, brown children
rollicked nakedly in the school-house, learned games in which they
delighted, and some of them were even beginning their ABC.
"Charles, my son," said Blair to Evans, as they were all sitting in
usual conclave on the verandah one evening, "what do you say to
vaccinating the whole community, lock, stock, and barrel? All, I mean,
that did not have the plague. There may be some germs of it lurking in
hidden corners yet."
"I'm willing, if you can bring them to it. I can take them in batches."
"I'll speak to Ha'o. He can make them do pretty well anything he
pleases. I'm more and more thankful that he was spared to us."
"And Nai too," said Jean. "She is a great help. The women do whatever
she tells them, and she's as bright as a needle. What do you think she
came to ask for to-day, Ken?"
"No idea. Not a pair of shoes, I hope."
"No--some hairpins! She wanted to do her hair like ours."
"The eternal feminine," laughed Blair. "Well?"
"I assured her that it looked far nicer hanging loose with flowers
stuck in it. But she was so disappointed that I had to give her the
pins. You won't recognise the women in a day or two, I expect."
Blair explained the vaccination idea to Ha'o, and made it as clear as
the limitations of language and understanding of so abstruse a matter
permitted.
"You would give them a little crawling death to keep them from having
it big?" said Ha'o, after much explanation.
"Yes, that is what it comes to."
"All those who did not have it before?"
"Yes."
"I will order it. It is right that Ra'a's people should taste it too."
Exactly what he told them they never learned, but in due course a batch
of stalwart brown men came doubtfully into the compound, and watched
Evans with apprehensive, white-eyed glances as he deftly pricked and
bound up their arms, and sent them away looking doubtfully at their
white bandages, in evident expectation of speedy and unique
developments.
They were in fine healthy condition and the operation was prosperous.
The bandage-wearers regarded them as badges of distinction. They
looked upon their inoculation as a ceremonial necessary to full
admission to the white alliance, and Blair was at once scandalised and
amused by a crowd clamouring round the house next day for similar
honours.
"Kenni," they cried, "make us Christians too! Prick our arms and give
us our badges."
So their arms were pricked and they got their badges, and were no
longer subject to the taunts of the favoured first batch, which had
nearly led to friction in the village the night before.