Chapter 10

There was a great meeting of the ancients in the speak-house; and one ancient spoke for Malamalama, and another ancient spoke for Salesa, and another ancient spoke for Professor No No, and still another ancient spoke for Billy Hindoo; and the whole matter was inquired into from the first day and debated in turn by all the ancients, and a final judgment at length arrived at. Malamalama was confirmed in his latest marriage, swearing with his hand on the Holy Book that in future he would cease his evil and cling to her, giving a fine mat by way of reparation to each of her predecessors; and Salesa was declared divorced from Malamalama, and she and Professor No No were ordered to marry themselves forthwith before the pastor Tanielu; and Billy Hindoo was commanded to go back to his master and remain within the taboo line under pain of death, and an ancient was appointed to visit him daily to lash him if he misbehaved even in the smallest matter; and then the whole meeting prayed first for rain, and then that God might send a ship.

When the new arrangement was with difficulty explained to the white man, he was as one crazed, waving his arms and screaming out "No, no!" without cessation; and he persisted thus, to the scandal of everyone, until Tanielu, losing patience, struck him like that on the head and married him immediately to Salesa, whose face shone with contentment and happiness. In this manner Professor No No and Salesa and Billy Hindoo were escorted homeward to their camp; and then everyone breathed with relief and congratulated one another on so peaceful and satisfactory a settlement.

But the ancients were still in their places when Salesa returned, saying that Professor No No had repulsed her; and behind her was Billy Hindoo, equally repulsed, who said his master refused to pay him his wages to that day or to send him back at once to the white country according to the covenant; and behind them both was Professor No No with his head tied in a towel, where the pastor had hurt him, cursing and reviling like a maniac.

Then the ancients held another meeting; and lo! it was a secret meeting; and Tanielu spoke for God, and everyone made speeches in turn; and it was recalled, with eloquent outbursts, how peaceful and happy Uvea had been in the days preceding Professor No No's arrival. There were some who wanted to have him killed as a punishment; and others who voted against Salesa, saying it was she who was at fault; and still others who burned with resentment against Billy Hindoo, declaring that he was the worst of all. Thus, like a battle rolling to and fro, Salesa, Professor No No, and Billy Hindoo were each in turn imperiled; and when day broke, their fate, though they knew it not, had been finally settled by the ancients.

Professor No No's boat was carried by twenty men from the lagoon shore, where it lay, over to the ocean beach; and with it was borne sardines and biscuit and beer from the white man's store; and the glass barrels were emptied, many of them, of their dead fish, being washed and refilled with fresh water from the spring, and their glass tops fastened tightly with cocoanut sinnet. Then, when everything had been made ready, Billy Hindoo was forced to seat himself in the bow of the boat; and in the stern were put Salesa and Professor No No, side by side, the center being filled with the cargo of provisions and water.

And Salesa laughed and joked with the men, begging them to take out Billy Hindoo, or to give him a boat of his own; and saying wildly, when denied, that she was going where none might whip her now, to find a beautiful island whereon to live with her husband. But the white man was convulsed with fear, and said nothing in the making ready of the boat, not even "No, no" when Salesa put her arms round him and kissed him again and again on the lips; and Billy Hindoo shook like a wet dog in the bow, whimpering, "Hi, yi! me British subject! me no likey!" babbling deliriously besides of his wages even to that day, and of the unfulfilled covenant with its passage to the white country in a ship.

Then the sail was hoisted and the sheet put into Salesa's hand; and in this wise the boat was shoved into deep water, and her bow headed straight to seaward. Then Tanielu fell on his knees and prayed that Uvea might be delivered forever and ever of such an infliction; and the young men formed a line with their rifles, ready to shoot if the voyagers showed the least sign of coming back; and across the waves one could see Salesa supporting Professor No No as the boat lay over in the wind, and her mocking laughter was borne back to us. And we waited and waited and waited as it became a diminishing speck against the sky; and waited and waited and waited until it disappeared. Then, lo! there were explosions of thunder and lightning, and the rain descended in torrents, and the little children all threw off their clothes and ran about rejoicing in the wet, while the elders looked at one another, and said, "Lo, Uvea is delivered!"

CAPTAIN ELIJAH COE

Puna Punou lies in 14th South exactly, though the writer keeps back the longitood for reasons that will soon be understood by the gentle reader--if the gentle reader is patient and won't skip. Not that there is any buried treasure there, or any foolishness of that kind; it's girls mostly, and pearl shell and cocoanuts, that Puna Punou produces, and you don't need no chart with red crosses from my dying hands to find any of them. But Mrs. Tweedie is still alive, and likewise Elijah Coe, and I'd be acting like the son of a sea cook if I did a hand's turn to hurt either. Of course it's an old story now, going back to the days before the bottom had dropped out of copra, and there was still money to be made in beach-la-mar and fungus. Oh, my, yes! a long time ago, before steam ever got into the Group, before law and order and compulsory vaccination, and an hour and a half of Deputy Commissioner every nine months.

It was always a mighty fine island to look at, rising sheer from the sea to basaltic cliffs, and high needlelike pinnacles, and forested solid from the water's edge to almost the top; and off the main settlement of Fale a Lupo there was good holding ground in six fathoms. A tidy little island, indeed, and I'd never raise it of a dawn, and all its palms and beaches and little basket-work houses peeping out of the deep shade, but I'd feel glad all over again that it was there, and breathe in the fragrant smell of it like a child happy at getting home from school. I guess the people there helped a lot, too, for they were the handsomest in the Pacific, and it was a regular port of call for the whalers to take in green stuff, girls, fresh water, and firewood.

In the old days it was the Rev. John Geer who ran the missionary mill, and taught the heathen to put their pennies in the plate and wear pants--not that they ever did the last to any alarming extent, except in the annual reports that were sent back to be printed East; while Mrs. Geer she homeopathed the island and inculcurated the principles of female virtoo in the young. But after twenty-one years of it the Geers returned home to Connecticut, and the Tweedies were landed from the _Olive Branch_ barkentine, to take their places in that section of the world's vineyard.

Tweedie was a hay-colored little man, narrer chested and tallowy, but if ever there was a copper-riveted Christian from Christianville I guess he was _it_! Meek! Why he was happy to get slapped, he was that pleased to turn the other cheek; and if you took away his cloak, he was the kind of fellar who wanted you to take his panjammers extra. Had no spirit at all, and the Kanakas walked over him scandalous. But it was his wife I wanted to tell about, Alethea Tweedie; for if ever there was an angel from heaven, with the prettiest blue eyes, and hair like streaming gold, and the cherriest lips you ever saw out of a chromo, and teeth whiter than--than--(it don't sound right to say a shark's) it was that peerless creature.

How Tweedie could have captured such a bang-up stunner was hard to understand then, and harder afterwards. A king on his throne might have been glad to win Alethea Tweedie for his queen, and captains and supercargoes would have knifed each other for a single smile, if she had been the kind to lead them on--which, Lord bless me! was the last thought she had in her curly head. I suppose she came from one of them little places back East where it's all women for miles, and they rate anything a man that can raise a whisker! Thrown away, that's what the beach called it, and misdoubted whether Tweedie wasn't a girl, too, only with drill trousers instead of panties.

In all them brown faces and tanned leathery white ones you can imagine what a pink rosebud she seemed to be; and it wasn't like that she stopped at that, for she could sing like a nightingale and talk to beat the band; and her laugh itself was like music, sounding long afterwards in your ears at sea. Hit? Jimini Christmas, I should say I was hit! Am still, for that matter, with just the memory of her, though twenty years have come and gone, and I loved the ground her little feet walked on. Not that there was anything out of the way in that. We all did, down to Portuguese Joe, and Billy Jones's cousin; and as for Elijah Coe, he simply give one yelp and keeled over!

Coe was the captain and owner of the _Peep o' Day_ topsail schooner, and had been trading about the Group for a matter of eight years. In all my seafaring days I never saw his match for dare-deviltry or courage, though a quieter man to look at there never was. He was about forty years old, tall and lean, with a nose on him like a hawk; and to see him stripped you'd think he was a boy, he was that straight and well set up. A fine man to look at, very quick on his pins, and kind of proud and silent in company like he was mostly thinking of something else. I reckon perhaps he likely was, for he was splendidly educated, with rows on rows of books in his cabin, and a cyclopediar six feet long. The mate said he knew everything in it up to R, not to speak of working lunars in a saucer of quicksilver, and reckonizing squid by its Latin name.

No one knew how he had got the money to buy his ship, which was a remarkable fine vessel and fitted up regardless. Some said there was once a name on the brass bell aft, which had been filed down careful and worked over with emery paper afterwards; but I never could see no sign of it myself, though I never went aboard but I took a good look; and others who said it was Labor. He certainly knew a lot about the Westward, and I heard him, one day, giving Captain Rick the directions to enter Port McGuire by. But you know what a place the beach is for talk, and, anyway, heaps of good men and highly respected have been Blackbirders in their time, and I never could see no harm in the trade myself. But the gossip was that he had flown the Peruvian flag and emptied whole islands, though I never believed a word of it myself. It was remarkable, too, how he kep his people, and how they looked up to him, which wouldn't have been the case if he had been like they represented. There was John Rau, the mate, a bullet-headed Belgian, who used to walk just like _he_ did and copy all his little ways slavish, reading the cyclopediar, too, and stopping at R from discipline. And Lum, the China cook, a freak of a fellar, with coal-black hair all round his head like a girl's, and who'd out-Coe Coe till you'd split. The rest of the crew was just the usual thing--Rotumah boys, an Highwayman or two, and some Nieues--sometimes the same, sometimes different--like on any island vessel.

It was some time before Captain Coe got on to the Tweedies, or Alethea, as I suppose I ought to say, for nobody ever took no particular stock in the _he_-Tweedie. He ran acrost her first when he was ashore doctoring some of his native friends, and handing out pain-killer and salts unstinted. They walked home together to the Mission house, standing a long time at the door, and he talking with his hat off. He must have been well brought up and used to meeting ladies, for anybody could tell by her face that she was pleased. She didn't seem the least bit eager to let him go, and once she took his Tahiti hat and held it in both her hands like she would prevent him. And he didn't seem to want to go neither, though he wrastled for his hat, very perlite and gay, and I could see the glisten of her white teeth through the spyglass.

The next day he called in state, with the skull of a shark in a silk handkerchief, and a man carrying a crate of onions. Oh, it may sound common to you, but it's like sending flowers to your lady-love in Puna Punou, and I've seen a year pass without the sight of one! I guess he walked in on velvet, and it is certain he stayed nigh two hours, for I timed him myself from the deck of the _Ransom_--the beach being a great place to take notice, as I have said already--and what was our feelings when next Sunday the captain marched into church--yes, sir--in crisp new panjammers and a polkadot neckerchief; and I'm blest if John Rau wasn't there, too, likewise polka-dotted; and that there Chinaman tagging along behind, rigged the same, only with earrings extra, and taking a back seat out of respeck! Afterwards they all went up to the Mission house in a body, Tweedie jumping in with an address, and everybody singing except the Chinaman, who was made to stop!

You mustn't think for a minute that we traders knew the missionary or that he knew us, or that the beach took any part in this except at a distance. There's no love lost between missionaries and traders. That's what made it so strange to see Captain Coe going the way he did, and taking up with all that nigger-loving and "Johnny, how's your soul?" We could only see one reason, and that was Alethea Tweedie; and the betting was about even whether he'd pull it off or not. But if we didn't _talk_ to the Tweedies, I guess there was mighty little that went on there we didn't know of--whether it was turtle steak for breakfast, or the tiff they had about her wearing too gauzy a dress at the party Coe gave aboard the _Peep o' Day_.

He did it up in style, with bunting and Chinese lanterns and the king, and afterwards there was fireworks. Oh, my, yes! a regular blow-out, with the crew in new jumpers and two boatloads of flowers and _moso'oi_! We all asked one another where it was going to end, what with the picnic next day, and him always at the Mission house. But we might have saved our breath, as far as any scandal was concerned, for, instead of up stick and away, with the lady locked in his cabin, like some of the beach had fondly hoped, what did Coe do but turn missionary himself! Got religion, by God! till you couldn't have known him for the same master mariner; while John Rau and Lum, not to be behindhand neither, cavorted into the holy swim with a whoop and a bang! The captain went off terrific--like everything he did--making Billy Jones's cousin marry his wife, and Peter Extrum marry _his_; and there was more half-caste baptizing and squealing and certificating than I remember since the tidal wave of Eighty-one!

Coe put it all down to conviction and a change of heart, but anybody could see it was Alethea Tweedie who was _his_ religion. When he prayed, which he used to do tremendous, it was all the time to Mrs. Tweedie; and when he said the kingdom of heaven, you knew mighty well that to him it was the coral Mission house on the hill. He put her on a pedestal a mile high, and kept her at the top by worshiping so hard at the bottom. I guess she couldn't have got off without stepping all over him, and was just forced to be a saint whether she wanted to or no. Not but what she was as good as gold, and a pattern for any young white woman to go by, but her eyes always kind of melted when she looked at Coe; which was no wonder, as he stood six feet high and straight as a dart, and every girl in the island was wild about him; and she had an imperious little way of treating him like he was a favorite dog who she was proud to show off being master of. She sent him her canary, which was all she had in the world except her clothes, and wrote a little piece how it would sing to him at sea and soothe his rugged bosom.

This wasn't all he got neither, for she was a great one with her needle, and did texts better nor a Sailors' Home. Coe's cabin was more like a little Bethel than the inside of a trading ship, for there was six of them, and a red worsted dog extra, playing with a blue worsted ball, and "Jesus, Lover of my Soul" and "Where is my Wandering Boy To-night?" The biggest joke of all was in the trade room, where there was "Honesty is the Best Policy," and "God Sees You"; and the boys guyed Coe about it unmerciful till he laid out Tom Dawlish with a fancy lamp, and said a gentleman ought to know where to stop. He was an awful thin-skinned kind of Christian when it came to any remarks being passed on Mrs. Tweedie, and Tom has a scar there to this day, though Coe made it up to him afterwards with a melodian worth nine dollars.

But Coe wasn't the only dog around the Mission house. Mrs. Tweedie started up another, a scamp of a chief named Afiola. In every community there's some fellar who's at the root of all the mischief that happens, so that if anybody gets speared of a dark night, or a girl is missing from home, you know just where to look for who done it. In Puna Punou you looked for Afiola, and the chances were you'd find him drunk on orange beer and laying for trouble with a gun. Oh, yes, indeed, there was two to his credit, to my certain knowledge, murders both, and I'll bet a ton of shell to an old hat besides that he had a hand in taking off the Chinaman at Oa Bay. A regular bad lot, and, like every big scalawag, every little scalawag had to tail along with him, too, for company and mutual protection; so his houses was the kind of Bowery of Puna Punou, with the whalers going to him to buy girls, and all that.

There were higher chiefs than Afiola in the settlement--five or six of them, at least, not to speak of the king--but none of them seemed able to do a thing to stop him. They were all a slack lot at any time, and thought excommunicating him enough, and taking away his communion ticket. I guess he had been out of the church for a matter of six years, and, as I said before, he was the scandal of the place and a terror. They were all dead scared of him, that was the truth, and, though his following was small, they were ugly customers and well armed, and could line up a dozen rifles in the twinkling of an eye. We often talked it over among ourselves how to break the gang up, but, as he always left the whites alone, and was even a favorite with the worst, it ended like it begun--in smoke.

This Afiola wasn't of any particular age, because the natives don't know when they are born, and have nothing to go by like dates and sich. I suppose Afiola was somewheres around thirty, for he had two children, about eight or nine each, a girl and a boy, who lived with him in his house, together with Talavao, his old mother, Sosofina, his aunt, Oloa, his uncle, his brother Filipo, and a raft of other blood relations whose names I disremember. Like all the chiefs of Puna Punou, Afiola was a tall, fine-looking man, very vigorous, lordly, and pleasant spoken, and if it weren't for his pock-marked face and the wickedest eyes I ever saw in a man's head, you would have said he was a perfect gentleman, and handsome, as Kanakas go. I had never had a bit of trouble with him myself, and whenever I put business in his way he had always come down prompt with pigs and mats and _masoa_.

It was a long time before he took any notice of the Tweedies, not going to church, and always busy raising a little hell somewheres. But when it came, it came with a bang and no mistake, and, my stars, if he didn't pull in the slack! He made up to the Mission house like he was their long-lost brother; threw fits of reformation till they took him back into church membership again; and not a blessed day passed but it was pigs or chickens or sugar cane or pineapples at the Mission-house door, and please, might their servant Afiola approach their Excellencies! It was as good as a play to see the rascal winding them around his little finger and doing injured innocent on their front stoop. To hear him gas, you'd think there was a conspiracy to run him out of Fale a Lupo; and even when he owned up to some of his misdeeds, it was like a compliment to the Tweedies for having yanked in such a black sheep. I read somewheres that the road to success is to trade on people's weaknesses, and the soft spot with the Tweedies was their desire to make a thundering success and leave all their predecessors in the soup. After having captured the chief white sinner, Elijah Coe, they were now hauling in the boss brown one, Afiola, and I guess they felt as pleased as a fellar who's bought a ton of shell for a condemned army musket.

My, but they were good to that man, forever inviting him to breakfast or that, and sending for him first thing if they were in a fix! It was all Afiola this, and Afiola that; and he got texts, too, from Mrs. Tweedie, and red worsted dogs, and "God Bless Our Home." By the time they had engineered him into shoes and pants, no one daring to laugh for fear he'd shoot them, they promoted him deacon, and put him on the committee for reroofing the church. Of all mutton-headed proceedings, I never saw the like, specially as he hoodwinked them right along, and acted worse, even, than before. You can imagine Captain Coe's feelings when, rounding up a three months' cruise, he found this six-foot-three of black devil and hypocrite snugged in the Mission house like a maggot in a breadfruit. They say he went on awful, speaking out the truth before them all, and daring Afiola to deny it. But Mrs. Tweedie she got him outside on the veranda, walking up and down with her arm through his, and pleading and going on and begging to beat the band. It shows the power she had over him, that at last he went in and asked Afiola's pardon, and the next day sent him a case of kerosene by way of reparation. I suppose if she had told him to go on his knees he would have done it, being that crazy to please her in everything.

On second thoughts, however, and after hearing how Afiola had been kicking up, he went to the king and tried to stiffen him to take a stand against Afiola, volunteering to do the job himself, if supported, and proposing to exile the fellar to Makatea, and disperse the rest of the gang about the Group gratis in the _Peep o' Day_. He said otherwise he was afraid to leave Puna Punou with such a scoundrel loose, and threatened to write to Sydney for a man-of-war. But Maunga the king was a saphead and a coward, and he couldn't see it Coe's way at all; and not having the sense to keep his mouth shut, what does he do but traipse around the settlement, telling everybody what the captain said and wanted.