Nearly an hour had passed since the girl had left her father's house,
and now, as the sun dipped into the ocean, the flowing tide swept
through the narrow channel in little waves of seething foam, and Ema,
with one last look at the path on the opposite side, descended to the
beach, and throwing off her loose bodice of blue print and her short
skirt, tied around her waist a native waist-girdle of yellow grass, and
stepped into the cold waters of the channel.
For some few minutes she laved herself, singing softly the while to
herself as is customary with many Polynesian native women when bathing,
when suddenly, through the humming drone of the beating surf on the
windward reef, she heard the sound or voices.
“Ah!” she said to herself, “now I will wait and startle these girls from
Tabeâue as they come along.” And so she sank low down in the water, so
that only her dark head showed above the surface.
But amid the sound of native voices she heard the unfamiliar tones of
white men, and in an instant she sprang to the shore, and, seizing her
clothes, fled to the shelter of the boulder.
In a minute she had dressed herself, and was peering out through the
fast-gathering darkness at a group of figures she could just discern on
the opposite side of the channel. They had halted, and the girl could
hear the natives in the party discussing means as to getting the white
men across, for the water was now deep, and the current was swirling
through the narrow pass with great velocity.
There were in the party some eight or ten natives and nearly as many
white men; and these latter, the girl could see, were in uniform, and
carried arms; for presently one of them, who stood a little apart from
the others, struck a light and lit a cheroot, and she caught the gleam
of musket-barrels in the hands of those who were grouped in the rear.
Wondering how it came about that armed white men were searching through
the island at such an hour, the girl was about to call out to the
natives--some of whom she recognised--not to attempt the passage without
a canoe, when she heard the sound of oars, and looking across the
darkening waters of the lagoon she saw a boat, filled with men, pulling
rapidly along in the direction of Utiroa.
When just abreast of the passage they ceased rowing, and a figure stood
in the stern, and hailed the shore party.
“Are you there, Mr. Fenton?”
“Yes,” answered the man who had struck the light. “Come in here, Adams,
and take us across. There is a channel here, and though I guess it is
not very deep, the current is running like a mill-race.”
Still crouching behind the coral boulder the girl saw the boat row in to
the shore, a little distance further down, so as to escape the swirling
eddies of the passage.
As the man-o'-war cutter--for such was the boat--touched the rocks, a
lantern was held up, and by its light the girl saw a short, stout man
step out on to the beach and walk up to the officer in charge of the
shore party.
“Ah, Adams, is that you? Well, this is a devil of a place. We have
crossed at least half a dozen of these cursed gutters, and thought to
have crossed this one too, without trouble, but the tide is coming in
fast. However, it's the last one--at least so this infernal hang-dog
looking native guide tells me. So the sooner we get across in the cutter
and get this man-hunting business over the better I'll like it.”
“Aye, aye, sir!” answered the man he had addressed as Adams. “It won't
take us much longer, I guess. Not a canoe has passed us going down the
coast, so we are pretty sure to catch him at home.”
“That is what this truculent scoundrel says,” and the officer nodded in
the direction of a native who had seated himself on the ground only a
few yards distant from the rock behind which the girl was hidden.
“He tells me that young Swain came home about a week ago from
Maiana”--another island of the group--“and the old man induced him to
stay at home and help him rig a new boat he has just built.”
“We'll catch him, sir,” answered Adams, confidently.
Clutching the side of the rough boulder in an agony of terror, the girl
saw the two men turn away, and, followed by the rest of the shore party,
natives and all, walk down to the boat. Then, standing upright, she
watched them get in and the cutter shove off.
That they were in search of her brother she was now only too certain,
and dreading that the boat would land the shore party again on her
side of the channel and she be discovered and prevented from giving the
alarm, she sprang over the loose slabs of coral that strewed the
shore between the water and the coconut palms, and fled along the
night-enshrouded path towards her father's house.
Ere she had gained the level ground the clattering sound made by the
displaced coral stones reached the ears of those in the boat, which
was instantly headed for shore, and the officer, with eight or ten
bluejackets, leapt out and, led by the native guides, followed in swift
pursuit.