'O yes, I 'ear you,' said Huish.

'He's been doing good business here, then,' continued the captain. 'For
ten years, he's been doing a great business. It's pearl and shell, of
course; there couldn't be nothing else in such a place, and no doubt
the shell goes off regularly by this Trinity Hall, and the money for it
straight into the bank, so that's no use to us. But what else is there?
Is there nothing else he would be likely to keep here? Is there nothing
else he would be bound to keep here? Yes, sir; the pearls! First,
because they're too valuable to trust out of his hands. Second, because
pearls want a lot of handling and matching; and the man who sells his
pearls as they come in, one here, one there, instead of hanging back and
holding up--well, that man's a fool, and it's not Attwater.'

'Likely,' said Huish, 'that's w'at it is; not proved, but likely.'

'It's proved,' said Davis bluntly.

'Suppose it was?' said Herrick. 'Suppose that was all so, and he had
these pearls--a ten years' collection of them?--Suppose he had? There's
my question.'

The captain drummed with his thick hands on the board in front of him;
he looked steadily in Herrick's face, and Herrick as steadily looked
upon the table and the pattering fingers; there was a gentle oscillation
of the anchored ship, and a big patch of sunlight travelled to and fro
between the one and the other.

'Hear me!' Herrick burst out suddenly.

'No, you better hear me first,' said Davis. 'Hear me and understand me.
WE'VE got no use for that fellow, whatever you may have. He's your kind,
he's not ours; he's took to you, and he's wiped his boots on me and
Huish. Save him if you can!'

'Save him?' repeated Herrick.

'Save him, if you're able!' reiterated Davis, with a blow of his
clenched fist. 'Go ashore, and talk him smooth; and if you get him and
his pearls aboard, I'll spare him. If you don't, there's going to be a
funeral. Is that so, Huish? does that suit you?'

'I ain't a forgiving man,' said Huish, 'but I'm not the sort to spoil
business neither. Bring the bloke on board and bring his pearls along
with him, and you can have it your own way; maroon him where you
like--I'm agreeable.'

'Well, and if I can't?' cried Herrick, while the sweat streamed upon his
face. 'You talk to me as if I was God Almighty, to do this and that! But
if I can't?'

'My son,' said the captain, 'you better do your level best, or you'll
see sights!'

'O yes,' said Huish. 'O crikey, yes!' He looked across at Herrick with
a toothless smile that was shocking in its savagery; and his ear caught
apparently by the trivial expression he had used, broke into a piece of
the chorus of a comic song which he must have heard twenty years before
in London: meaningless gibberish that, in that hour and place, seemed
hateful as a blasphemy: 'Hikey, pikey, crikey, fikey, chillingawallaba
dory.'

The captain suffered him to finish; his face was unchanged.

'The way things are, there's many a man that wouldn't let you go
ashore,' he resumed. 'But I'm not that kind. I know you'd never go back
on me, Herrick! Or if you choose to--go, and do it, and be damned!' he
cried, and rose abruptly from the table.

He walked out of the house; and as he reached the door, turned and
called Huish, suddenly and violently, like the barking of a dog. Huish
followed, and Herrick remained alone in the cabin.

'Now, see here!' whispered Davis. 'I know that man. If you open your
mouth to him again, you'll ruin all.'



Chapter 8. BETTER ACQUAINTANCE

The boat was gone again, and already half-way to the Farallone, before
Herrick turned and went unwillingly up the pier. From the crown of
the beach, the figure-head confronted him with what seemed irony,
her helmeted head tossed back, her formidable arm apparently hurling
something, whether shell or missile, in the direction of the anchored
schooner. She seemed a defiant deity from the island, coming forth to
its threshold with a rush as of one about to fly, and perpetuated in
that dashing attitude. Herrick looked up at her, where she towered above
him head and shoulders, with singular feelings of curiosity and romance,
and suffered his mind to travel to and fro in her life-history. So long
she had been the blind conductress of a ship among the waves; so long
she had stood here idle in the violent sun, that yet did not avail
to blister her; and was even this the end of so many adventures? he
wondered, or was more behind? And he could have found in his heart to
regret that she was not a goddess, nor yet he a pagan, that he might
have bowed down before her in that hour of difficulty.

When he now went forward, it was cool with the shadow of many well-grown
palms; draughts of the dying breeze swung them together overhead; and on
all sides, with a swiftness beyond dragon-flies or swallows, the spots
of sunshine flitted, and hovered, and returned. Underfoot, the sand was
fairly solid and quite level, and Herrick's steps fell there noiseless
as in new-fallen snow. It bore the marks of having been once weeded like
a garden alley at home; but the pestilence had done its work, and the
weeds were returning. The buildings of the settlement showed here and
there through the stems of the colonnade, fresh painted, trim and dandy,
and all silent as the grave. Only, here and there in the crypt, there
was a rustle and scurry and some crowing of poultry; and from behind the
house with the verandahs, he saw smoke arise and heard the crackling of
a fire.

The stone houses were nearest him upon his right. The first was locked;
in the second, he could dimly perceive, through a window, a certain
accumulation of pearl-shell piled in the far end; the third, which stood
gaping open on the afternoon, seized on the mind of Herrick with its
multiplicity and disorder of romantic things. Therein were cables,
windlasses and blocks of every size and capacity; cabin windows and
ladders; rusty tanks, a companion hutch; a binnacle with its brass
mountings and its compass idly pointing, in the confusion and dusk of
that shed, to a forgotten pole; ropes, anchors, harpoons, a blubber
dipper of copper, green with years, a steering wheel, a tool chest with
the vessel's name upon the top, the Asia: a whole curiosity-shop of sea
curios, gross and solid, heavy to lift, ill to break, bound with brass
and shod with iron. Two wrecks at the least must have contributed to
this random heap of lumber; and as Herrick looked upon it, it seemed to
him as if the two ships' companies were there on guard, and he heard
the tread of feet and whisperings, and saw with the tail of his eye the
commonplace ghosts of sailor men.

This was not merely the work of an aroused imagination, but had
something sensible to go upon; sounds of a stealthy approach were no
doubt audible; and while he still stood staring at the lumber, the voice
of his host sounded suddenly, and with even more than the customary
softness of enunciation, from behind.

'Junk,', it said, 'only old junk! And does Mr Hay find a parable?'

'I find at least a strong impression,' replied Herrick, turning quickly,
lest he might be able to catch, on the face of the speaker, some
commentary on the words.

Attwater stood in the doorway, which he almost wholly filled; his hands
stretched above his head and grasping the architrave. He smiled when
their eyes Met, but the expression was inscrutable.

'Yes, a powerful impression. You are like me; nothing so affecting as
ships!' said he. 'The ruins of an empire would leave me frigid, when a
bit of an old rail that an old shellback leaned on in the middle watch,
would bring me up all standing. But come, let's see some more of the
island. It's all sand and coral and palm trees; but there's a kind of a
quaintness in the place.'

'I find it heavenly,' said Herrick, breathing deep, with head bared in
the shadow.

'Ah, that's because you're new from sea,' said Attwater. 'I dare say,
too, you can appreciate what one calls it. It's a lovely name. It has
a flavour, it has a colour, it has a ring and fall to it; it's like its
author--it's half Christian! Remember your first view of the island, and
how it's only woods and water; and suppose you had asked somebody for
the name, and he had answered--nemorosa Zacynthos!'

'Jam medio apparet fluctu!' exclaimed Herrick. 'Ye gods, yes, how good!'

'If it gets upon the chart, the skippers will make nice work of it,'
said Attwater. 'But here, come and see the diving-shed.'

He opened a door, and Herrick saw a large display of apparatus neatly
ordered: pumps and pipes, and the leaded boots, and the huge snouted
helmets shining in rows along the wall; ten complete outfits.

'The whole eastern half of my lagoon is shallow, you must understand,'
said Attwater; 'so we were able to get in the dress to great advantage.
It paid beyond belief, and was a queer sight when they were at it,
and these marine monsters'--tapping the nearest of the helmets--'kept
appearing and reappearing in the midst of the lagoon. Fond of parables?'
he asked abruptly.

'O yes!' said Herrick.

'Well, I saw these machines come up dripping and go down again, and come
up dripping and go down again, and all the while the fellow inside as
dry as toast!' said Attwater; 'and I thought we all wanted a dress to
go down into the world in, and come up scatheless. What do you think the
name was?' he inquired.

'Self-conceit,' said Herrick.

'Ah, but I mean seriously!' said Attwater.

'Call it self-respect, then!' corrected Herrick, with a laugh.

'And why not Grace? Why not God's Grace, Hay?' asked Attwater. 'Why
not the grace of your Maker and Redeemer, He who died for you, He
who upholds you, He whom you daily crucify afresh? There is nothing
here,'--striking on his bosom--'nothing there'--smiting the wall--'and
nothing there'--stamping--'nothing but God's Grace! We walk upon it, we
breathe it; we live and die by it; it makes the nails and axles of the
universe; and a puppy in pyjamas prefers self-conceit!' The huge dark
man stood over against Herrick by the line of the divers' helmets, and
seemed to swell and glow; and the next moment the life had gone from
him. 'I beg your pardon,' said he; 'I see you don't believe in God?'

'Not in your sense, I am afraid,' said Herrick.

'I never argue with young atheists or habitual drunkards,' said Attwater
flippantly. 'Let us go across the island to the outer beach.'

It was but a little way, the greatest width of that island scarce
exceeding a furlong, and they walked gently. Herrick was like one in
a dream. He had come there with a mind divided; come prepared to study
that ambiguous and sneering mask, drag out the essential man from
underneath, and act accordingly; decision being till then postponed.
Iron cruelty, an iron insensibility to the suffering of others, the
uncompromising pursuit of his own interests, cold culture, manners
without humanity; these he had looked for, these he still thought he
saw. But to find the whole machine thus glow with the reverberation of
religious zeal, surprised him beyond words; and he laboured in vain, as
he walked, to piece together into any kind of whole his odds and ends
of knowledge--to adjust again into any kind of focus with itself, his
picture of the man beside him.

'What brought you here to the South Seas?' he asked presently.

'Many things,' said Attwater. 'Youth, curiosity, romance, the love of
the sea, and (it will surprise you to hear) an interest in missions.
That has a good deal declined, which will surprise you less. They go the
wrong way to work; they are too parsonish, too much of the old wife, and
even the old apple wife. CLOTHES, CLOTHES, are their idea; but clothes
are not Christianity, any more than they are the sun in heaven, or could
take the place of it! They think a parsonage with roses, and church
bells, and nice old women bobbing in the lanes, are part and parcel
of religion. But religion is a savage thing, like the universe it
illuminates; savage, cold, and bare, but infinitely strong.'

'And you found this island by an accident?' said Herrick.

'As you did!' said Attwater. 'And since then I have had a business, and
a colony, and a mission of my own. I was a man of the world before I was
a Christian; I'm a man of the world still, and I made my mission pay.
No good ever came of coddling. A man has to stand up in God's sight
and work up to his weight avoirdupois; then I'll talk to him, but not
before. I gave these beggars what they wanted: a judge in Israel, the
bearer of the sword and scourge; I was making a new people here; and
behold, the angel of the Lord smote them and they were not!'

With the very uttering of the words, which were accompanied by a
gesture, they came forth out of the porch of the palm wood by the margin
of the sea and full in front of the sun which was near setting. Before
them the surf broke slowly. All around, with an air of imperfect wooden
things inspired with wicked activity, the crabs trundled and scuttled
into holes. On the right, whither Attwater pointed and abruptly turned,
was the cemetery of the island, a field of broken stones from the
bigness of a child's hand to that of his head, diversified by many
mounds of the same material, and walled by a rude rectangular enclosure.
Nothing grew there but a shrub or two with some white flowers; nothing
but the number of the mounds, and their disquieting shape, indicated the
presence of the dead.

  'The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep!'

quoted Attwater as he entered by the open gateway into that unholy
close. 'Coral to coral, pebbles to pebbles,' he said, 'this has been the
main scene of my activity in the South Pacific. Some were good, and some
bad, and the majority (of course and always) null. Here was a fellow,
now, that used to frisk like a dog; if you had called him he came like
an arrow from a bow; if you had not, and he came unbidden, you should
have seen the deprecating eye and the little intricate dancing
step. Well, his trouble is over now, he has lain down with kings and
councillors; the rest of his acts, are they not written in the book
of the chronicles? That fellow was from Penrhyn; like all the Penrhyn
islanders he was ill to manage; heady, jealous, violent: the man with
the nose! He lies here quiet enough. And so they all lie.

 "And darkness was the burier of the dead!"'

He stood, in the strong glow of the sunset, with bowed head; his voice
sounded now sweet and now bitter with the varying sense.

'You loved these people?' cried Herrick, strangely touched.

'I?' said Attwater. 'Dear no! Don't think me a philanthropist. I dislike
men, and hate women. If I like the islands at all, it is because you see
them here plucked of their lendings, their dead birds and cocked hats,
their petticoats and coloured hose. Here was one I liked though,' and he
set his foot upon a mound. 'He was a fine savage fellow; he had a dark
soul; yes, I liked this one. I am fanciful,' he added, looking hard at
Herrick, 'and I take fads. I like you.'

Herrick turned swiftly and looked far away to where the clouds were
beginning to troop together and amass themselves round the obsequies of
day. 'No one can like me,' he said.

'You are wrong there,' said the other, 'as a man usually is about
himself. You are attractive, very attractive.'

'It is not me,' said Herrick; 'no one can like me. If you knew how I
despised myself--and why!' His voice rang out in the quiet graveyard.

'I knew that you despised yourself,' said Attwater. 'I saw the blood
come into your face today when you remembered Oxford. And I could have
blushed for you myself, to see a man, a gentleman, with these two vulgar
wolves.'

Herrick faced him with a thrill. 'Wolves?' he repeated.

'I said wolves and vulgar wolves,' said Attwater. 'Do you know that
today, when I came on board, I trembled?'

'You concealed it well,' stammered Herrick.

'A habit of mine,' said Attwater. 'But I was afraid, for all that: I was
afraid of the two wolves.' He raised his hand slowly. 'And now, Hay, you
poor lost puppy, what do you do with the two wolves?'

'What do I do? I don't do anything,' said Herrick. 'There is nothing
wrong; all is above board; Captain Brown is a good soul; he is a... he
is...' The phantom voice of Davis called in his ear: 'There's going to
be a funeral' and the sweat burst forth and streamed on his brow. 'He
is a family man,' he resumed again, swallowing; 'he has children at
home--and a wife.'

'And a very nice man?' said Attwater. 'And so is Mr Whish, no doubt?'

'I won't go so far as that,' said Herrick. 'I do not like Huish. And
yet... he has his merits too.'

'And, in short, take them for all in all, as good a ship's company as
one would ask?' said Attwater.

'O yes,' said Herrick, 'quite.'

'So then we approach the other point of why you despise yourself?' said
Attwater.

'Do we not all despise ourselves?' cried Herrick. 'Do not you?'

'Oh, I say I do. But do I?' said Attwater. 'One thing I know at least:
I never gave a cry like yours. Hay! it came from a bad conscience! Ah,
man, that poor diving dress of self-conceit is sadly tattered! Today,
now, while the sun sets, and here in this burying place of brown
innocents, fall on your knees and cast your sins and sorrows on the
Redeemer. Hay--'

'Not Hay!' interrupted the other, strangling. 'Don't call me that! I
mean... For God's sake, can't you see I'm on the rack?'

'I see it, I know it, I put and keep you there, my fingers are on the
screws!' said Attwater. 'Please God, I will bring a penitent this
night before His throne. Come, come to the mercy-seat! He waits to be
gracious, man--waits to be gracious!'

He spread out his arms like a crucifix, his face shone with the
brightness of a seraph's; in his voice, as it rose to the last word, the
tears seemed ready.

Herrick made a vigorous call upon himself. 'Attwater,' he said, 'you
push me beyond bearing. What am I to do? I do not believe. It is living
truth to you; to me, upon my conscience, only folk-lore. I do not
believe there is any form of words under heaven by which I can lift the
burthen from my shoulders. I must stagger on to the end with the pack of
my responsibility; I cannot shift it; do you suppose I would not, if I
thought I could? I cannot--cannot--cannot--and let that suffice.'

The rapture was all gone from Artwater's countenance; the dark apostle
had disappeared; and in his place there stood an easy, sneering
gentleman, who took off his hat and bowed. It was pertly done, and the
blood burned in Herrick's face.

'What do you mean by that?' he cried.

'Well, shall we go back to the house?' said Attwater. 'Our guests will
soon be due.'

Herrick stood his ground a moment with clenched fists and teeth; and as
he so stood, the fact of his errand there slowly swung clear in front of
him, like the moon out of clouds. He had come to lure that man on board;
he was failing, even if it could be said that he had tried; he was sure
to fail now, and knew it, and knew it was better so. And what was to be
next?

With a groan he turned to follow his host, who was standing with polite
smile, and instantly and somewhat obsequiously led the way in the now
darkened colonnade of palms. There they went in silence, the earth
gave up richly of her perfume, the air tasted warm and aromatic in the
nostrils; and from a great way forward in the wood, the brightness of
lights and fire marked out the house of Attwater.

Herrick meanwhile resolved and resisted an immense temptation to go up,
to touch him on the arm and breathe a word in his ear: 'Beware, they are
going to murder you.' There would be one life saved; but what of the two
others? The three lives went up and down before him like buckets in a
well, or like the scales of balances. It had come to a choice, and one
that must be speedy. For certain invaluable minutes, the wheels of life
ran before him, and he could still divert them with a touch to the one
side or the other, still choose who was to live and who was to die. He
considered the men. Attwater intrigued, puzzled, dazzled, enchanted and
revolted him; alive, he seemed but a doubtful good; and the thought of
him lying dead was so unwelcome that it pursued him, like a vision, with
every circumstance of colour and sound. Incessantly, he had before him
the image of that great mass of man stricken down in varying attitudes
and with varying wounds; fallen prone, fallen supine, fallen on his
side; or clinging to a doorpost with the changing face and the relaxing
fingers of the death-agony. He heard the click of the trigger, the thud
of the ball, the cry of the victim; he saw the blood flow. And this
building up of circumstance was like a consecration of the man, till he
seemed to walk in sacrificial fillets. Next he considered Davis, with
his thick-fingered, coarse-grained, oat-bread commonness of nature, his
indomitable valour and mirth in the old days of their starvation, the
endearing blend of his faults and virtues, the sudden shining forth of a
tenderness that lay too deep for tears; his children, Adar and her bowel
complaint, and Adar's doll. No, death could not be suffered to approach
that head even in fancy; with a general heat and a bracing of his
muscles, it was borne in on Herrick that Adar's father would find in him
a son to the death. And even Huish showed a little in that sacredness;
by the tacit adoption of daily life they were become brothers; there was
an implied bond of loyalty in their cohabitation of the ship and their
passed miseries, to which Herrick must be a little true or wholly
dishonoured. Horror of sudden death for horror of sudden death, there
was here no hesitation possible: it must be Attwater. And no sooner was
the thought formed (which was a sentence) than his whole mind of man ran
in a panic to the other side: and when he looked within himself, he was
aware only of turbulence and inarticulate outcry.

In all this there was no thought of Robert Herrick. He had complied with
the ebb-tide in man's affairs, and the tide had carried him away; he
heard already the roaring of the maelstrom that must hurry him under.
And in his bedevilled and dishonoured soul there was no thought of self.

For how long he walked silent by his companion Herrick had no guess.
The clouds rolled suddenly away; the orgasm was over; he found himself
placid with the placidity of despair; there returned to him the power of
commonplace speech; and he heard with surprise his own voice say: 'What
a lovely evening!'

'Is it not?' said Attwater. 'Yes, the evenings here would be very
pleasant if one had anything to do. By day, of course, one can shoot.'

'You shoot?' asked Herrick.

'Yes, I am what you would call a fine shot,' said Attwater. 'It is
faith; I believe my balls will go true; if I were to miss once, it would
spoil me for nine months.'

'You never miss, then?' said Herrick.

'Not unless I mean to,' said Attwater. 'But to miss nicely is the art.
There was an old king one knew in the western islands, who used to empty
a Winchester all round a man, and stir his hair or nick a rag out of his
clothes with every ball except the last; and that went plump between the
eyes. It was pretty practice.'

'You could do that?' asked Herrick, with a sudden chill.

'Oh, I can do anything,' returned the other. 'You do not understand:
what must be, must.'

They were now come near to the back part of the house. One of the men
was engaged about the cooking fire, which burned with the clear, fierce,
essential radiance of cocoanut shells. A fragrance of strange meats was
in the air. All round in the verandahs lamps were lighted, so that
the place shone abroad in the dusk of the trees with many complicated
patterns of shadow.

'Come and wash your hands,' said Attwater, and led the way into a clean,
matted room with a cot bed, a safe, or shelf or two of books in a glazed
case, and an iron washing-stand. Presently he cried in the native, and
there appeared for a moment in the doorway a plump and pretty young
woman with a clean towel.

'Hullo!' cried Herrick, who now saw for the first time the fourth
survivor of the pestilence, and was startled by the recollection of the
captain's orders.

'Yes,' said Attwater, 'the whole colony lives about the house, what's
left of it. We are all afraid of devils, if you please! and Taniera and
she sleep in the front parlour, and the other boy on the verandah.'

'She is pretty,' said Herrick.

'Too pretty,' said Attwater. 'That was why I had her married. A man
never knows when he may be inclined to be a fool about women; so when we
were left alone, I had the pair of them to the chapel and performed the
ceremony. She made a lot of fuss. I do not take at all the romantic view
of marriage,' he explained.

'And that strikes you as a safeguard?' asked Herrick with amazement.

'Certainly. I am a plain man and very literal. WHOM GOD HATH JOINED
TOGETHER, are the words, I fancy. So one married them, and respects the
marriage,' said Attwater.

'Ah!' said Herrick.

'You see, I may look to make an excellent marriage when I go home,'
began Attwater, confidentially. 'I am rich. This safe alone'--laying his
hand upon it--'will be a moderate fortune, when I have the time to place
the pearls upon the market. Here are ten years' accumulation from a
lagoon, where I have had as many as ten divers going all day long; and I
went further than people usually do in these waters, for I rotted a lot
of shell, and did splendidly. Would you like to see them?'

This confirmation of the captain's guess hit Herrick hard, and he
contained himself with difficulty. 'No, thank you, I think not,' said
he. 'I do not care for pearls. I am very indifferent to all these...'

'Gewgaws?' suggested Attwater. 'And yet I believe you ought to cast an
eye on my collection, which is really unique, and which--oh! it is the
case with all of us and everything about us!--hangs by a hair. Today
it groweth up and flourisheth; tomorrow it is cut down and cast into the
oven. Today it is here and together in this safe; tomorrow--tonight!--it
may be scattered. Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of
thee.'

'I do not understand you,' said Herrick.

'Not?' said Attwater.

'You seem to speak in riddles,' said Herrick, unsteadily. 'I do not
understand what manner of man you are, nor what you are driving at.'

Attwater stood with his hands upon his hips, and his head bent forward.
'I am a fatalist,' he replied, 'and just now (if you insist on it)
an experimentalist. Talking of which, by the bye, who painted out the
schooner's name?' he said, with mocking softness, 'because, do you know?
one thinks it should be done again. It can still be partly read; and
whatever is worth doing, is surely worth doing well. You think with
me? That is so nice! Well, shall we step on the verandah? I have a dry
sherry that I would like your opinion of.'

Herrick followed him forth to where, under the light of the hanging
lamps, the table shone with napery and crystal; followed him as the
criminal goes with the hangman, or the sheep with the butcher; took the
sherry mechanically, drank it, and spoke mechanical words of praise. The
object of his terror had become suddenly inverted; till then he had seen
Attwater trussed and gagged, a helpless victim, and had longed to run in
and save him; he saw him now tower up mysterious and menacing, the angel
of the Lord's wrath, armed with knowledge and threatening judgment. He
set down his glass again, and was surprised to see it empty.

'You go always armed?' he said, and the next moment could have plucked
his tongue out.

'Always,' said Attwater. 'I have been through a mutiny here; that was
one of my incidents of missionary life.'

And just then the sound of voices reached them, and looking forth from
the verandah they saw Huish and the captain drawing near.



Chapter 9. THE DINNER PARTY

They sat down to an island dinner, remarkable for its variety and
excellence; turtle soup and steak, fish, fowls, a sucking pig, a
cocoanut salad, and sprouting cocoanut roasted for dessert. Not a tin
had been opened; and save for the oil and vinegar in the salad, and some
green spears of onion which Attwater cultivated and plucked with his own
hand, not even the condiments were European. Sherry, hock, and claret
succeeded each other, and the Farallone champagne brought up the rear
with the dessert.

It was plain that, like so many of the extremely religious in the
days before teetotalism, Attwater had a dash of the epicure. For such
characters it is softening to eat well; doubly so to have designed and
had prepared an excellent meal for others; and the manners of their host
were agreeably mollified in consequence.

A cat of huge growth sat on his shoulders purring, and occasionally,
with a deft paw, capturing a morsel in the air. To a cat he might be
likened himself, as he lolled at the head of his table, dealing
out attentions and innuendoes, and using the velvet and the claw
indifferently. And both Huish and the captain fell progressively under
the charm of his hospitable freedom.

Over the third guest, the incidents of the dinner may be said to have
passed for long unheeded. Herrick accepted all that was offered him, ate
and drank without tasting, and heard without comprehension. His mind
was singly occupied in contemplating the horror of the circumstances in
which he sat. What Attwater knew, what the captain designed, from which
side treachery was to be first expected, these were the ground of his
thoughts. There were times when he longed to throw down the table and
flee into the night. And even that was debarred him; to do anything,
to say anything, to move at all, were only to precipitate the barbarous
tragedy; and he sat spellbound, eating with white lips. Two of his
companions observed him narrowly, Attwater with raking, sidelong glances
that did not interrupt his talk, the captain with a heavy and anxious
consideration.

'Well, I must say this sherry is a really prime article,' said Huish.
''Ow much does it stand you in, if it's a fair question?'

'A hundred and twelve shillings in London, and the freight to
Valparaiso, and on again,' said Attwater. 'It strikes one as really not
a bad fluid.'

'A 'undred and twelve!' murmured the clerk, relishing the wine and the
figures in a common ecstasy: 'O my!'

'So glad you like it,' said Attwater. 'Help yourself, Mr Whish, and keep
the bottle by you.'

'My friend's name is Huish and not Whish, sit,' said the captain with a
flush.

'I beg your pardon, I am sure. Huish and not Whish, certainly,' said
Attwater. 'I was about to say that I have still eight dozen,' he added,
fixing the captain with his eye.

'Eight dozen what?' said Davis.

'Sherry,' was the reply. 'Eight dozen excellent sherry. Why, it seems
almost worth it in itself; to a man fond of wine.'

The ambiguous words struck home to guilty consciences, and Huish and the
captain sat up in their places and regarded him with a scare.

'Worth what?' said Davis.

'A hundred and twelve shillings,' replied Attwater.

The captain breathed hard for a moment. He reached out far and wide to
find any coherency in these remarks; then, with a great effort, changed
the subject.

'I allow we are about the first white men upon this island, sir,' said
he.

Attwater followed him at once, and with entire gravity, to the new
ground. 'Myself and Dr Symonds excepted, I should say the only ones,' he
returned. 'And yet who can tell? In the course of the ages someone may
have lived here, and we sometimes think that someone must. The cocoa
palms grow all round the island, which is scarce like nature's planting.
We found besides, when we landed, an unmistakable cairn upon the beach;
use unknown; but probably erected in the hope of gratifying some mumbo
jumbo whose very name is forgotten, by some thick-witted gentry whose
very bones are lost. Then the island (witness the Directory) has been
twice reported; and since my tenancy, we have had two wrecks, both
derelict. The rest is conjecture.'

'Dr Symonds is your partner, I guess?' said Davis.

'A dear fellow, Symonds! How he would regret it, if he knew you had been
here!' said Attwater.

''E's on the Trinity 'All, ain't he?' asked Huish.

'And if you could tell me where the Trinity 'All was, you would confer a
favour, Mr Whish!' was the reply.

'I suppose she has a native crew?' said Davis.

'Since the secret has been kept ten years, one would suppose she had,'
replied Attwater.

'Well, now, see 'ere!' said Huish. 'You have everything about you in
no end style, and no mistake, but I tell you it wouldn't do for me. Too
much of "the old rustic bridge by the mill"; too retired, by 'alf. Give
me the sound of Bow Bells!'

'You must not think it was always so,' replied Attwater, 'This was once
a busy shore, although now, hark! you can hear the solitude. I find it
stimulating. And talking of the sound of bells, kindly follow a little
experiment of mine in silence.' There was a silver bell at his right
hand to call the servants; he made them a sign to stand still, struck
the bell with force, and leaned eagerly forward. The note rose clear and
strong; it rang out clear and far into the night and over the deserted
island; it died into the distance until there only lingered in the
porches of the ear a vibration that was sound no longer. 'Empty houses,
empty sea, solitary beaches!' said Attwater. 'And yet God hears the
bell! And yet we sit in this verandah on a lighted stage with all heaven
for spectators! And you call that solitude?'

There followed a bar of silence, during which the captain sat
mesmerised.

Then Attwater laughed softly. 'These are the diversions of a lonely,
man,' he resumed, 'and possibly not in good taste. One tells oneself
these little fairy tales for company. If there SHOULD happen to be
anything in folk-lore, Mr Hay? But here comes the claret. One does not
offer you Lafitte, captain, because I believe it is all sold to the
railroad dining cars in your great country; but this Brine-Mouton is of
a good year, and Mr Whish will give me news of it.'

'That's a queer idea of yours!' cried the captain, bursting with a sigh
from the spell that had bound him. 'So you mean to tell me now, that
you sit here evenings and ring up... well, ring on the angels... by
yourself?'

'As a matter of historic fact, and since you put it directly, one does
not,' said Attwater. 'Why ring a bell, when there flows out from oneself
and everything about one a far more momentous silence? the least beat of
my heart and the least thought in my mind echoing into eternity for ever
and for ever and for ever.'

'O look 'ere,' said Huish, 'turn down the lights at once, and the Band
of 'Ope will oblige! This ain't a spiritual seance.'

'No folk-lore about Mr Whish--I beg your pardon, captain: Huish not
Whish, of course,' said Attwater.

As the boy was filling Huish's glass, the bottle escaped from his hand
and was shattered, and the wine spilt on the verandah floor. Instant
grimness as of death appeared on the face of Attwater; he smote the
bell imperiously, and the two brown natives fell into the attitude
of attention and stood mute and trembling. There was just a moment of
silence and hard looks; then followed a few savage words in the native;
and, upon a gesture of dismissal, the service proceeded as before.

None of the party had as yet observed upon the excellent bearing of the
two men. They were dark, undersized, and well set up; stepped softly,
waited deftly, brought on the wines and dishes at a look, and their eyes
attended studiously on their master.

'Where do you get your labour from anyway?' asked Davis.

'Ah, where not?' answered Attwater.

'Not much of a soft job, I suppose?' said the captain.

'If you will tell me where getting labour is!' said Attwater with a
shrug. 'And of course, in our case, as we could name no destination,
we had to go far and wide and do the best we could. We have gone as far
west as the Kingsmills and as far south as Rapa-iti. Pity Symonds isn't
here! He is full of yarns. That was his part, to collect them. Then
began mine, which was the educational.'

'You mean to run them?' said Davis.

'Ay! to run them,' said Attwater.

'Wait a bit,' said Davis, 'I'm out of my depth. How was this? Do you
mean to say you did it single-handed?'


'One did it single-handed,' said Attwater, 'because there was nobody to
help one.'

'By God, but you must be a holy terror!' cried the captain, in a glow of
admiration.

'One does one's best,' said Attwater.

'Well, now!' said Davis, 'I have seen a lot of driving in my time and
been counted a good driver myself; I fought my way, third mate, round
the Cape Horn with a push of packet rats that would have turned the
devil out of hell and shut the door on him; and I tell you, this racket
of Mr Attwater's takes the cake. In a ship, why, there ain't nothing to
it! You've got the law with you, that's what does it. But put me down on
this blame' beach alone, with nothing but a whip and a mouthful of bad
words, and ask me to... no, SIR! it's not good enough! I haven't got the
sand for that!' cried Davis. 'It's the law behind,' he added; 'it's the
law does it, every time!'

'The beak ain't as black as he's sometimes pynted,' observed Huish,
humorously.

'Well, one got the law after a fashion,' said Attwater. 'One had to be a
number of things. It was sometimes rather a bore.'

'I should smile!' said Davis. 'Rather lively, I should think!'

'I dare say we mean the same thing,' said Attwater. 'However, one way
or another, one got it knocked into their heads that they MUST work, and
they DID... until the Lord took them!'

''Ope you made 'em jump,' said Huish.

'When it was necessary, Mr Whish, I made them jump,' said Attwater.

'You bet you did,' cried the captain. He was a good deal flushed, but
not so much with wine as admiration; and his eyes drank in the huge
proportions of the other with delight. 'You bet you did, and you bet
that I can see you doing it! By God, you're a man, and you can say I
said so.'

'Too good of you, I'm sure,' said Attwater.

'Did you--did you ever have crime here?' asked Herrick, breaking his
silence with a pungent voice.

'Yes,' said Attwater, 'we did.'

'And how did you handle that, sir?' cried the eager captain.

'Well, you see, it was a queer case,' replied Attwater, 'it was a case
that would have puzzled Solomon. Shall I tell it you? yes?'

The captain rapturously accepted.

'Well,' drawled Attwater, 'here is what it was. I dare say you know two
types of natives, which may be called the obsequious and the sullen?
Well, one had them, the types themselves, detected in the fact; and one
had them together. Obsequiousness ran out of the first like wine out
of a bottle, sullenness congested in the second. Obsequiousness was all
smiles; he ran to catch your eye, he loved to gabble; and he had about
a dozen words of beach English, and an eighth-of-an-inch veneer of
Christianity. Sullens was industrious; a big down-looking bee. When
he was spoken to, he answered with a black look and a shrug of one
shoulder, but the thing would be done. I don't give him to you for a
model of manners; there was nothing showy about Sullens; but he was
strong and steady, and ungraciously obedient. Now Sullens got into
trouble; no matter how; the regulations of the place were broken, and
he was punished accordingly--without effect. So, the next day, and the
next, and the day after, till I began to be weary of the business, and
Sullens (I am afraid) particularly so. There came a day when he was in
fault again, for the--oh, perhaps the thirtieth time; and he rolled a
dull eye upon me, with a spark in it, and appeared to speak. Now
the regulations of the place are formal upon one point: we allow no
explanations; none are received, none allowed to be offered. So one
stopped him instantly; but made a note of the circumstance. The next
day, he was gone from the settlement. There could be nothing more
annoying; if the labour took to running away, the fishery was wrecked.
There are sixty miles of this island, you see, all in length like the
Queen's Highway; the idea of pursuit in such a place was a piece of
single-minded childishness, which one did not entertain. Two days later,
I made a discovery; it came in upon me with a flash that Sullens had
been unjustly punished from beginning to end, and the real culprit
throughout had been Obsequiousness. The native who talks, like the woman
who hesitates, is lost. You set him talking and lying; and he talks, and
lies, and watches your face to see if he has pleased you; till at
last, out comes the truth! It came out of Obsequiousness in the regular
course. I said nothing to him; I dismissed him; and late as it was, for
it was already night, set off to look for Sullens. I had not far to go:
about two hundred yards up the island, the moon showed him to me. He was
hanging in a cocoa palm--I'm not botanist enough to tell you how--but
it's the way, in nine cases out of ten, these natives commit suicide.
His tongue was out, poor devil, and the birds had got at him; I spare
you details, he was an ugly sight! I gave the business six good hours of
thinking in this verandah. My justice had been made a fool of; I don't
suppose that I was ever angrier. Next day, I had the conch sounded and
all hands out before sunrise. One took one's gun, and led the way, with
Obsequiousness. He was very talkative; the beggar supposed that all was
right now he had confessed; in the old schoolboy phrase, he was
plainly 'sucking up' to me; full of protestations of goodwill and
good behaviour; to which one answered one really can't remember what.
Presently the tree came in sight, and the hanged man. They all burst out
lamenting for their comrade in the island way, and Obsequiousness was
the loudest of the mourners. He was quite genuine; a noxious creature,
without any consciousness of guilt. Well, presently--to make a long
story short--one told him to go up the tree. He stared a bit, looked at
one with a trouble in his eye, and had rather a sickly smile; but went.
He was obedient to the last; he had all the pretty virtues, but the
truth was not in him. So soon as he was up, he looked down, and there
was the rifle covering him; and at that he gave a whimper like a dog.
You could bear a pin drop; no more keening now. There they all crouched
upon the ground, with bulging eyes; there was he in the tree top, the
colour of the lead; and between was the dead man, dancing a bit in the
air. He was obedient to the last, recited his crime, recommended his
soul to God. And then...'

Attwater paused, and Herrick, who had been listening attentively, made a
convulsive movement which upset his glass.

'And then?' said the breathless captain.

'Shot,' said Attwater. 'They came to ground together.'

Herrick sprang to his feet with a shriek and an insensate gesture.

'It was a murder,' he screamed. 'A cold-hearted, bloody-minded
murder! You monstrous being! Murderer and hypocrite--murderer and
hypocrite--murderer and hypocrite--' he repeated, and his tongue
stumbled among the words.

The captain was by him in a moment. 'Herrick!' he cried, 'behave
yourself! Here, don't be a blame' fool!'

Herrick struggled in his embrace like a frantic child, and suddenly
bowing his face in his hands, choked into a sob, the first of many,
which now convulsed his body silently, and now jerked from him
indescribable and meaningless sounds.

'Your friend appears over-excited,' remarked Attwater, sitting unmoved
but all alert at table.

'It must be the wine,' replied the captain. 'He ain't no drinking
man, you see. I--I think I'll take him away. A walk'll sober him up, I
guess.'

He led him without resistance out of the verandah and into the night, in
which they soon melted; but still for some time, as they drew away,
his comfortable voice was to be heard soothing and remonstrating, and
Herrick answering, at intervals, with the mechanical noises of hysteria.

''E's like a bloomin' poultry yard!' observed Huish, helping himself to
wine (of which he spilled a good deal) with gentlemanly ease. 'A man
should learn to beyave at table,' he added.

'Rather bad form, is it not?' said Attwater. 'Well, well, we are left
tete-a-tete. A glass of wine with you, Mr Whish!'



Chapter 10. THE OPEN DOOR

The captain and Herrick meanwhile turned their back upon the lights in
Attwater's verandah, and took a direction towards the pier and the beach
of the lagoon.

The isle, at this hour, with its smooth floor of sand, the pillared roof
overhead, and the prevalent illumination of the lamps, wore an air of
unreality like a deserted theatre or a public garden at midnight. A man
looked about him for the statues and tables. Not the least air of wind
was stirring among the palms, and the silence was emphasised by the
continuous clamour of the surf from the seashore, as it might be of
traffic in the next street.

Still talking, still soothing him, the captain hurried his patient on,
brought him at last to the lagoon-side, and leading him down the beach,
laved his head and face with the tepid water. The paroxysm gradually
subsided, the sobs became less convulsive and then ceased; by an odd but
not quite unnatural conjunction, the captain's soothing current of
talk died away at the same time and by proportional steps, and the
pair remained sunk in silence. The lagoon broke at their feet in petty
wavelets, and with a sound as delicate as a whisper; stars of all
degrees looked down on their own images in that vast mirror; and the
more angry colour of the Farallone's riding lamp burned in the middle
distance. For long they continued to gaze on the scene before them, and
hearken anxiously to the rustle and tinkle of that miniature surf, or
the more distant and loud reverberations from the outer coast. For long
speech was denied them; and when the words came at last, they came to
both simultaneously. 'Say, Herrick...'the captain was beginning.

But Herrick, turning swiftly towards his companion, bent him down with
the eager cry: 'Let's up anchor, captain, and to sea!'

'Where to, my son?' said the captain. 'Up anchor's easy saying. But
where to?'

'To sea,' responded Herrick. 'The sea's big enough! To sea--away from
this dreadful island and that, oh! that sinister man!'

'Oh, we'll see about that,' said Davis. 'You brace up, and we'll see
about that. You're all run down, that's what's wrong with you; you're
all nerves, like Jemimar; you've got to brace up good and be yourself
again, and then we'll talk.'

'To sea,' reiterated Herrick, 'to sea tonight--now--this moment!'

'It can't be, my son,' replied the captain firmly. 'No ship of mine puts
to sea without provisions, you can take that for settled.'

'You don't seem to understand,' said Herrick. 'The whole thing is over,
I tell you. There is nothing to do here, when he knows all. That man
there with the cat knows all; can't you take it in?'

'All what?' asked the captain, visibly discomposed. 'Why, he received us
like a perfect gentleman and treated us real handsome, until you began
with your foolery--and I must say I seen men shot for less, and nobody
sorry! What more do you expect anyway?'

Herrick rocked to and fro upon the sand, shaking his head.

'Guying us,' he said, 'he was guying us--only guying us; it's all we're
good for.'

'There was one queer thing, to be sure,' admitted the captain, with a
misgiving of the voice; 'that about the sherry. Damned if I caught on to
that. Say, Herrick, you didn't give me away?'

'Oh! give you away!' repeated Herrick with weary, querulous scorn. 'What
was there to give away? We're transparent; we've got rascal branded
on us: detected rascal--detected rascal! Why, before he came on board,
there was the name painted out, and he saw the whole thing. He made sure
we would kill him there and then, and stood guying you and Huish on the
chance. He calls that being frightened! Next he had me ashore; a fine
time I had! THE TWO WOLVES, he calls you and Huish.--WHAT IS THE PUPPY
DOING WITH THE TWO WOLVES? he asked. He showed me his pearls; he said
they might be dispersed before morning, and ALL HUNG BY A HAIr--and
smiled as he said it, such a smile! O, it's no use, I tell you! He knows
all, he sees through all; we only make him laugh with our pretences--he
looks at us and laughs like God!'

There was a silence. Davis stood with contorted brows, gazing into the
night.

'The pearls?' he said suddenly. 'He showed them to you? he has them?'

'No, he didn't show them; I forgot: only the safe they were in,' said
Herrick. 'But you'll never get them!'

'I've two words to say to that,' said the captain.

'Do you think he would have been so easy at table, unless he was
prepared?' cried Herrick. 'The servants were both armed. He was armed
himself; he always is; he told me. You will never deceive his vigilance.
Davis, I know it! It's all up; all up. There's nothing for it, there's
nothing to be done: all gone: life, honour, love. Oh, my God, my God,
why was I born?'

Another pause followed upon this outburst.

The captain put his hands to his brow.

'Another thing!' he broke out. 'Why did he tell you all this? Seems like
madness to me!'

Herrick shook his head with gloomy iteration. 'You wouldn't understand
if I were to tell you,' said he.

'I guess I can understand any blame' thing that you can tell me,' said
the captain.

'Well, then, he's a fatalist,' said Herrick.

'What's that, a fatalist?' said Davis.

'Oh, it's a fellow that believes a lot of things,' said Herrick,
'believes that his bullets go true; believes that all falls out as God
chooses, do as you like to prevent it; and all that.'

'Why, I guess I believe right so myself,' said Davis.

'You do?' said Herrick.

'You bet I do!' says Davis.

Herrick shrugged his shoulders. 'Well, you must be a fool,' said he, and
he leaned his head upon his knees.

The captain stood biting his hands.

'There's one thing sure,' he said at last. 'I must get Huish out of
that. HE'S not fit to hold his end up with a man like you describe.'

And he turned to go away. The words had been quite simple; not so the
tone; and the other was quick to catch it.