CHEUNG'S PLAN.
Cheung Li's restaurant did not cater to the social element of Suva,
but it was neat and clean, the food savory, wholesome and cheap, so
that he did a good waterfront business with white skippers, mates and
supercargoes.
He lived above the place, a placid, stout, sphinx-faced Chinaman
with a dignity all his own, getting together his fortune. Some said
the restaurant was a blind for his other affairs, but no one seemed
to definitely know what they might be. He extended credit from time
to time and seemed to find it profitable in the long run. It was he
himself who had suggested to Stanton that he need not worry about his
bill.
"Some time soon, something come along," he told him. "You 'Melican. You
make good bimeby."
He presided over the restaurant at rush hours, leaving its conduct the
rest of the time to two assistants. One of these, Moy, long, sallow,
cadaverous and chary of any speech but his own, set before Stanton
his meal. There was real turtle soup, excellent fish, turtle steak
with boiled _taro_-root and greens, fresh coconut pudding with caramel
sauce, and coffee the Ritz patrons might have envied. All for fifty
cents; a dollar and twenty cents for three daily meals, seven dollars a
week.
When Moy brought the pudding he had a message.
"Cheung Li like speak along of you topside when you finish up," he said.
It spoiled the dessert for Stanton. It must mean that his credit was
over. It had to come. Cheung had been mighty decent. But it looked like
the beach. He couldn't stay at Panakaloa's and not eat. He couldn't
honestly stay there any longer and pile up a debt he saw no means of
paying off. Panakaloa could always rent her rooms. He saw himself for
a moment roaming the beach with Tiki at his heels, adventuring in the
bush with a cannibal. Tiki would know more about making a living there
than he did.
He shrugged his shoulders, his hands steady as he rolled his second
cigarette. There was not enough left for a third, so he made this fat
and smoked it slowly with long inhalations before he got up, unable
to tip Moy. An outside staircase led to a balcony that ran all round
the house, covered and awninged. At the rear it looked over a compound
garden behind a high plank wall where Cheung took his ease with his
family.
Stanton had never mounted before. He was surprised at the signs of
comfort, of taste, even of luxury. There were easy chairs of bamboo,
stands of teak that held flowering plants, big vases of porcelain with
foliage shrubs and ferns in them, rugs, cushions, two Java thrushes
singing in cages, a gorgeous blue macaw in a ring, statuesque,
disdainful.
The front veranda, where Stanton thought the entrance must be, looked
over the harbor and the shipping, and across Kadavu Passage to the
distant isles of Ono and Kadavu, almost sixty miles away. The lure of
the horizon, of the unknown tropics, savage but fascinating, gripped
him hard. Then sliding glass doors opened and Cheung asked him inside.
He had never before seen Cheung except in white clothes, and he was
surprised at the quiet richness of his brocades, the assurance of
his manner, polite, unostentatious. He might have been greeting a
distinguished official rather than a man whose clothing proclaimed his
poverty.
He offered Stanton a deep and cosy seat and a cheroot faintly smelling
of tea, gratifying of flavor. Then he poured out two tiny goblets of
amber fluid that scented the whole room as if with orange groves and
tasted like sublimated Chartreuse.
His English was not perfect, but he spoke without hesitation, straight
to the purpose. It was as if he guessed Stanton's interpretation of the
request for the visit, and wished to relieve him promptly. The shady
chamber had an atmosphere of courtesy. From the interior Stanton heard
the tinkle of a stringed instrument, the sudden laughter of a child.
The Java thrushes were singing madly.
"I tell you some time, soon, something come along," said Cheung in his
mellow tones. "I not know then this come. One time, some one tell me
about one place where there are plenty pearl, on island where nobody
go. No landing there, no loadstead, no lagoon. Leef come up close,
evely place. Native not live that place now. Name Motutabu. Plenty
magic along that place. Bad magic. Maybe you not believe that?"
"I don't know," said Stanton simply. "I've heard a lot of curious
things."
Cheung grunted as if satisfied with the answer.
"This black man's magic," he said. "Not evil to white man, yellow man
unless they too much meddle. You savvy?"
"I savvy," said Stanton. His pulses were quickening, his blood
beginning to tingle. He felt that he was on the threshold of adventure,
mysterious, dangerous.
* * * * *
"On that island one big image," Cheung went on. "Not idol, all same
symbol. Symbol of evil spilits native men speak velley soft along, make
gift so he leave alone. Some one meddle along that god, not savvy how,
die velly quick. Suppose you go this place, you leave god alone. I send
white man I know along this Motutabu--that mean fo'bidden island. He is
good man, I tlust him plenty. I send Kanaka with him to dive. No one
come back. Long time now they should come back. Something happen. Maybe
he meddle too much along that god, maybe all get sick, maybe schooner
get on leef. I not know.
"I am li'l' aflaid some one else speak along the Kanaka who tell me
about that place. Li'l' while since he speak with me, they find him
dead along beach. Maybe because he talk, maybe because he no talk.
Nobody savvy who kill him. I no savvy. I think maybe one man, half
Chinaman, he savvy something. Maybe he go along Motutabu, but suppose
he did he not find pearl. If he find pearl he not come back to Suva. He
go to Sigapo'. Belong that place. But I like find out."
Singapore! Stanton had the flash, half intuition, half reasoning,
that is called a hunch. Singapore meant the Malay Peninsula. In his
mind's eye he saw the lithe figure of the Malay-Manchu, swaggering but
furtive, like a stalking panther, trailing the girl. He did not know
then how illuminating his hunch had been. But the name came to his
lips. "Loo Fong!"
Cheung grunted again.
"I always think you smaht," he said. "Li'l' bad luck, maybe, jus' now.
Loo Fong come back. I think he been along that island. Maybe he kill.
But I think he no find pearl. I like send you."
"I'm no sailor," Stanton disclaimed. "I've knocked about in a pleasure
boat or two, yachting, but I'm no navigator."
"I give you ship," Cheung purred on. "Captain and clew all same, they
lun ship. Chinamen. On island you boss. You find out what happen. Man
I send to island is 'Melican, all same you 'Melican. Suppose I send
Chinamen, suppose Loo Fong been that place, my man no tlust any one
but white man. His name Haines. I pay you good. Suppose you bling back
pearls, I give you plenty."
"You don't know anything about me," said Stanton. He was not demurring
to the proposition, but it had taken him off his feet a bit. It sounded
like a large order.
He did not lack confidence in himself, but this was a strange situation
he was asked to take command of. He could not immediately see himself
on a boat manned by Chinese, going to an island where some god, some
symbol of evil, was supposed to reign with malign influence; where
murder might have been done. He wanted to think it over, though he
wanted to go, aside from obliging Cheung.
"I savvy plenty," Cheung went on suavely. "You have bad luck; you live
cheap, not dlink, not lun up big bill at big hotel. You tly all time
find any kind of job. Not easy fo' 'Melican along this place. Li'l'
time ago you fight mate of Lehua. I like 'Melican who not blag, not
dlink, can fight. I like you velly much to go this tlip."
Stanton wondered a little at the other's knowledge of the fight, but it
was not surprising. Such news traveled fast. The restaurant was a sort
of club, in some ways. He was to wonder more how closely Cheung had
studied him.
"To-day steameh come," Cheung went on. "Haines, he had bad luck too,
long time. He tlade in copla, have bad luck. He go fo' shell an' pearl,
have bad luck. Lose schooneh, find shell eaten by oyster worm. His
wife die in United States. Then he catch job with me. He lite back to
his daughteh, pletty soon he make money. She no heah flom him long time
befo'. Now velly glad. She come to Suva. Come to-day. She nice gel. I
tell about her fatheh. She wollied, but she keep up chin all same you,
'Melican fashion. She want to go look fo' him. I say she can go along
with you."
Stanton gasped. Things were developing fast. He knew who the girl was.
She would recognize him when she saw him. He guessed why Loo Fong had
trailed her. Loo Fong knew of the island if he had not been there. It
was likely he had tried to pump the native who had first given Cheung
the information, and killed the poor devil. Why the latter had chosen
to confide in Cheung did not matter now. It was Cheung's affair.
Probably the man was indebted to him.
"I saw Loo Fong following a girl who came in on the Austral, I think,"
he said. Again Cheung gave one of his soft grunts of comprehension.
"Loo Fong plenty slick," he said. "I think he savvy gel ask fo' me. She
go along hotel now she come my place. Mo' betteh she stay this place.
Loo Fong savvy that, savvy you come see me, maybe savvy why. _Maskee!_
I think maybe you have to kill Loo Fong some time."
* * * * *
He spoke placidly enough, but, to Stanton, the room seemed suddenly
filled with a mist in which vague, battling figures moved, while in
the background there loomed the statue of a great, gray god and the
suggestion of fantastic cliffs and jungle.
He was looking on, now, but he was about to be involved in this.
Pearls, magic, murder. Mystery and sudden death. Romance. The girl's
face with the big eyes that had changed when they saw him, as if there
had been between them some affinity, was plain before him. He heard
Cheung clap his hands, and then the girl herself was in the room, in
the flesh, gazing at him as he rose.
"Missy Haines," Cheung was saying. "This Misteh Stanton. I think he go
along Motutabu fo' me."
Her hand was in his, cool and firm, her gaze was searching him, frank,
friendly.
"You don't mind if I go along?" she said. "I want to know what has
happened to my father, I want to see him again. He left me in school,
six years ago."
"Mind?" Stanton was filled with an idiotic desire to say the things
that crowded his brain, to give utterance to the impulses that thrilled
him. To acknowledge the joy that surged through him at the prospect of
being her knight-errant, her champion. There was no question now of his
not going. If Cheung had reserved this argument for the last, he had
chosen wisely. Stanton's actual answer was stiff, awkward.
"I shall be glad to serve you, if I can, to help your father, to be of
use to Cheung Li, who has befriended me."
"As he did my father," said the girl. Stanton thought he heard Cheung
chuckle, but his face was immobile.
"That settled," he said. "Now Stanton, talk business along with me.
Much to fix, quick as possible. To-mollow, maybe nex' day, you go."
The girl left and Cheung talked business. His schooner, with the
Chinese skipper and crew, were at Levuka on the island of Ovalau,
former capital of Fiji. It was not far away, less than fifty miles, and
he had sent word to them, expecting them to-morrow. He gave Stanton
money to buy necessary personal things, promising to furnish him
weapons. Motutabu was not on the regulation charts. It lay far to the
south and west, below the Kermadec Islands. Cheung showed its position
on a chart. At the end of the interview he gave certain grave warnings.
"I think Loo Fong go that place," he said. "Not find pearl. If he savvy
I send you I think he go back. Follow you, make plenty tlouble. Much
betteh he stay along that place."
There was a grim note in his voice that more than hinted his meaning.
Cheung had not attempted to dodge the fact that the trip was dangerous.
He seemed at once to value life and consider it of little value, like
the money changer who promptly throws out spurious coin. The crew of
his schooner would be armed. He had not sent Chinese in the first
place because natives were better divers; his own men were unused
to pearling, he used them for inter-island trading. But they were
fighters. They were his men.
Stanton was convinced that those who worked for Cheung were loyal,
bound by a fealty that went beyond pay. He saw depths to this man who
was running a lowly restaurant and living in something close to luxury.
He realized that the restaurant was a clearing house for gossip,
valuable to such a person as Cheung; shrewd, daring, efficient, he bent
his energies toward fortune, but was endowed with philosophy, a mode of
thought and life that raised him far above the ordinary.
"You not meddle along that god," Cheung said, the last thing. "And you
look out along of Loo Fong. You look out along that mate you fight.
Suppose you want take along that Tiki, can do. Maybe he can be useful
along in bush. That mate name Johnson. Schooneh Lehua. Captain Fenwick,
he sick, he stay in Suva. Cook quit too. Loo Fong he hold share in
Lehua. You look out. Take this now."
He took from a drawer in a lacquered cabinet a flat automatic of German
make, a vicious-looking thing of heavy caliber. As it lay cold in
Stanton's palm it seemed like some sort of fetish that was a tangible
link connecting him with the adventure, making it real. Cheung gave him
extra clips.
"Knife betteh," he said. "Make no noise. Suppose you have to shoot, may
make tlouble. But knife need plactice. You take. Johnson got no use fo'
you. Loo Fong may think you savvy where to find pearl. I no savvy that.
I think Haines hide all time, but I not know what place. Suppose he
dead, you tly find pearl. I see you this time to-mollow."
* * * * *
Stanton slid the automatic away into his hip pocket, and Cheung shook
his head.
"Pocket no good," he said. "Wait, I find."
He opened a chest and produced a spring clip-holder and leather
shoulder-harness which Stanton fitted then and there, taking off his
coat. The flat weapon lay close to his chest, snug and handy. There
would be other revolvers on board, with belts and holsters for open
use, but this manner was best, when one wore a coat, in Suva.
The police did not like foreigners to swank about with visible weapons.
It was an orderly and peaceful town, but many strange things went on
near by. There was the Rewa River, up which there was said to be a
hidden headquarters for fugitives and outlaws of all kinds and races,
waiting for secret transportation beyond extradition. Back of that,
in the mountains, drums sounded on certain moonlit midnights, and the
natives were still said to practice ancient and horrible rites of
cannibalism and sacrifice.
Suva was civilized. Fiji was pacified. But savagery lurked on every
hand.
Stanton made his purchases unostentatiously. He held the notion that he
was shadowed. He saw nothing of Loo Fong, but that crafty individual
had his following, who might be trailing Stanton for him. Stanton
was barbered, reclothed, reshod, his own man again. His account with
Cheung's restaurant was wiped out. He paid Panakaloa, together with a
present of a vivid scarf which she draped proudly across her ample
bosom, tears in her eyes as she thanked him and applauded his turn of
fortune.
He had native tobacco and a new pipe for Tiki, with cloth for a _sulu_
kilt with which to replace his inadequate G-string. The old pipe had
been smashed on the wharf, he had not tasted the flavor of tobacco or
its smoke for weeks, and his gratitude was inordinate. It was dark by
then, and Stanton left him curled up on his mats, smoking blissfully.
Stanton stayed close that night, sitting in Panakaloa's little garden,
smoking and thinking over the swift changes of chance. He had turned
a sudden corner and he did not know what lay ahead, save that it was
a man's work, savored with excitement and peril, heightened by the
entrance of the girl.
He slept with the automatic on his chest, over his pyjama top. It was
heavy but handy, and he did not take Cheung's warnings lightly. Loo
Fong might well believe, as Cheung had suggested, that Stanton was
going to Motutabu and knew where to find the pearls Cheung was sure
Haines had gathered.
In such a case they might decide to try to force that information out
of him, kidnap and torture him, rather than risk losing a race to the
island.
So Loo Fong had a share in the Lehua. The mate was in actual charge of
the schooner, to all intents and purposes its skipper. Loo Fong and the
mate would almost certainly get together. Johnson had his own grudge
against Stanton, which might materialize on its own account or join
forces with Loo Fong in his plans.
It seemed very likely indeed to Stanton that the Lehua might have been
to Motutabu on the trip from which she had just returned, with Loo Fong
in her. The cargo was more or less of a blind, picked up after the
trail for the pearls had failed.
If Tiki had been able to talk anything but his uncouth dialect Stanton
might have been able to find out from him. The cook would know; he was
probably leaving for some more definite reason than Johnson's slurs
on his cooking. If anything serious had happened on Motutabu the cook
might have decided to draw the line at piracy and quit while his neck
was still unstretched, in which case it was not likely that he would
talk. He had not been very prepossessing, as Stanton recollected. It
was a rough outfit.
* * * * *
Cheung would undoubtedly find out all that it was possible to gather.
Stanton felt that Cheung had not fully divulged himself in their talk,
that he knew or suspected far more than he had mentioned. And Stanton
was convinced that there had been grim doings on Motutabu and would be
more. It seemed doubtful if the girl's father was still alive. If he
were not, it would be no easy task to find the pearls. There would be
the girl to comfort and protect. If Loo Fong followed and was again
frustrated of the gems, he might consider the girl a secondary prize,
so much loot for his personal gratification and disposal.
Small doubt of that, Stanton fancied, remembering the way in which the
half-caste had trailed her. This mission was not the sort in which
a girl should be involved, but he knew that she was fully committed
to it, that Cheung was either willing she should go, or had tried to
dissuade her and failed. Tonight she was safe enough at Cheung's.
Cheung's measure of precaution would baffle even Loo Fong, Stanton felt
certain, and took comfort from it.
Panakaloa's house was far from a fortress, built in flimsy, tropic
fashion. It held no treasures, the window fastenings were light, the
doors had no bolts. The one to the back garden did not even have a key,
and the garden fence was easily scaled.
Stanton was a light sleeper. He held a hunch that the night was
breeding some sort of attempt, and he hoped to be ready for it when it
appeared. He dozed in cat-naps, waking intermittently, dropping off
again. Then, a little after midnight, he was roused by some unusual
sound that brought him standing to the floor, gun in hand, listening,
watching. Whatever had wakened him was veiled by sleep, but his
consciousness insisted there had been something.
There was no moon. The garden lay in mellow, tropic starlight, filled
with deep, soft shadows that shifted shape as the land wind moved
fronds and leafage. He saw nothing else; he stole to the door and
listened, opening it suddenly, finger on trigger.
It looked as if a great dog were lying down on the threshold. In the
vague light from the window he saw the faint glint of uprolled eyes. It
was Tiki. From gratitude or fidelity, prompted perhaps by some sense
developed in his savage subconsciousness of impending peril, he had
come in from his shed to get as close to his protector as he could.
"All right, Tiki," Stanton said quietly. "Good boy." It was like
talking to a dog, using tone to convey meaning. Tiki clucked something
in his throat as Stanton closed the door.
It was not easy to doze again after the thorough rousing. The actions
of the day, filmed in his brain, were automatically projected on the
mental screen.
He was no longer a derelict. No one would venture to call him or
describe him as a beach bum now. He had decent clothes, money in his
pocket, had fought and won, acquired a cannibal Man Friday, met a girl
who stirred feelings within him that he had never before experienced,
and he was embarked upon a wild enterprise in a savage setting. At last
the flickering flash-backs died out, and his mind became a blank.
The next thing he knew was a faint draft of air. The door was
open, a dark space where its paint had shown gray. The windows,
opening lengthwise, were apart. He could smell the night blossoms,
_ylang-ylang_, _frangipani_. As he swung off the bed something touched
his arm. It was Tiki, crouching low, hardly visible, pointing an arm,
vaguely silhouetted, at the window. Then he darted off, merging with
the gloom, back toward the open door.
* * * * *
The tops of croton bushes came above the sill. The wind moved them,
or was it something else? Stanton sat on the edge of the bed, his gun
ready to cover any intruder, remembering Cheung's caution that shooting
would bring trouble, wondering if he could be plainly seen. He felt
eyes watching him from the shrubbery, thought he could make out some
solid bulk amid the leaves. It was so still, so charged with suspense,
that he could hear the ticking of his watch.
Then there came a scuffle in the passage. Tiki had attacked, or been
attacked. At any rate, fed, and fortified by having a friendly master,
Tiki was fighting fiercely. Two struggling figures, locked in desperate
battle, rolled into the room.
Stanton caught the gleam of steel. Tiki had no weapon. He launched
himself from the edge of the bed, smashing at the hand that held the
blade with the muzzle of his gun, trying to locate the intruder's head.
It was an impossible task in the darkness and the fury of the combat.
He could tell only that the man was far bigger than Tiki, and at that,
like Tiki, he was practically naked. He could smell the rank sweat of
him.
For the moment he had forgotten the window, been forced to leave it
unguarded, suddenly aware of forms rising, writhing over the sill as he
whirled.
One of them was clothed and burly, the other a stinking savage, rancid
with palm oil, slippery as an eel. A sleeved arm was flung in front of
Stanton, thrust hard against his throat to cut off his wind. He broke
into tumultuous action, grasping the thick wrist with both hands,
turning, stooping, putting all he had into a heaving pull of his back
and shoulders. The weight of his adversary bore him down to one knee,
but Stanton flung him heels over head, crashing into the flimsy bureau;
then Stanton dived for the legs of the third man, and brought him
down across the bed, close to the foot of it, bounding on the springs
beneath the mattress.
Stanton leaped on him before he could get up or free the knife he
surely carried in his loin-cloth. The native's hands clawed for
Stanton's throat, lacerating the flesh. Stanton gripped one arm, bent
it backward on the iron railing of the bed, bent it until it cracked.
The savage yelled, leaping convulsively in his pain, and rolled to the
floor.
Tiki and his man were in the doorway again. Stanton heard their panting
grunts, and marveled at Tiki's resistance. The big man he had thrown
was getting up. There was electricity in Suva, and Panakaloa had bulbs
in her house. Stanton had no chance to get at his switch, but suddenly
the passage was illumined and an Amazonian voice angrily demanded what
was going on.
Panakaloa appeared, a shawl over her voluminous nightgown. She was
brandishing a club that had been part of her skipper husband's
collection of island weapons. The man had Tiki by the throat, squeezing
him until his eyes bulged from their sockets, his tongue protruding.
Panakaloa's club thudded down, and the seeming victor collapsed.
Stanton saw the other native scramble over the sill dangling his broken
arm. The clothed man rose from the ruins of the bureau and flung a
chair at Stanton before he followed. It came legs first, hard enough to
check Stanton's leap.
The two were gone, smashing through the shrubbery, up to the roof of
Tiki's shed by means of the rain-barrel Panakaloa used for watering her
garden, and over the fence.
* * * * *
Panakaloa and the light had routed them, aside from her by no means to
be despised club. They had no desire for the publicity her indignant
voice and arm might evoke. Stanton did not get a clear look at the face
of the man who had thrown the chair, the room was still in partial
shadow, but he was almost certain it had been Johnson, mate of the
Lehua, and the other two were Solomon Islanders, members of the crew.
The one still lay senseless from the blow of the hardwood club. He was
as black as Tiki, but bigger; his sharp filed teeth showing in the
relaxed jaw. For a moment Stanton thought Panakaloa had killed him, and
said so. She shook her head.
"Too much thick, that skull," she answered. "Maybe I crack it li'l.
Serve him right. You want I call police, Sanatoni?" she asked shrewdly.
"I'd rather not," he answered; and she nodded.
"We take that trash outside, then," she said. "A fine cheek they got to
come along my house."
"It's my fault," he told her. "They were after me."
Whether the mate had been bent on private reprisal or was in league
with Loo Fong to knock him senseless and take him prisoner was
uncertain, and not pertinent now they were foiled. Tiki had balked
their attempt in the beginning; Panakaloa, with her unexpected sortie,
had completed the rout.
Tiki was massaging his throat, but he grinned. The fight had not
exhausted him. Now that he had become attached to some one, he had shed
much of his misery like an old garment. He helped the two of them bear
the sagging body of the still unconscious man out into the deserted
street and set it down in the lee of a cereus hedge that topped a stone
wall. There was no one in sight, no sound of the other two, and they
left him there.
"I owe you a bureau, Panakaloa," said Stanton. "I owe you more than
that. You came just in time."
"Ugh!" grunted Panakaloa contemptuously. "That bureau not much good.
I pay four dollar for that along of junkman." She sat down and began
to laugh, her stout body shaking like a jelly, her eyes rolling upward
while Tiki surveyed her in awe and amazement. "Too much I fool that
_kaikanaka_. My old man, the _kapitani_, one time he hit me with that
club. This time I get even. When that black trash wake up he think the
house fall in on him."
Tiki did not understand what she said, but he grinned widely at her
tone. She insisted upon opening beer for herself and Stanton, and she
gave Tiki a glass, which he tasted suspiciously and then swallowed it
with a comical grimace of surprised delight as he rubbed his stomach.
Native fashion, Panakaloa had strengthened the brew with a slug of
Hollands gin.
It was beginning to get light when she left them, still chuckling over
her prowess, vastly pleased with herself. Tiki was too proud at what
Stanton said to him, patting his shoulder the while. It was Greek to
the islander, but he knew it for praise.