“I wish I could make out,” Case answered, shaking his head.  “Appears
like one of their tomfool superstitions.  That’s what I don’t cotton to,”
he said.  “It’s like the business about Vigours.”

“I’d like to know what you mean by that, and I’ll trouble you to tell
me,” says I.

“Well, you know, Vigours lit out and left all standing,” said he.  “It
was some superstition business—I never got the hang of it but it began to
look bad before the end.”

“I’ve heard a different story about that,” said I, “and I had better tell
you so.  I heard he ran away because of you.”

“O! well, I suppose he was ashamed to tell the truth,” says Case; “I
guess he thought it silly.  And it’s a fact that I packed him off.  ‘What
would you do, old man?’ says he.  ‘Get,’ says I, ‘and not think twice
about it.’  I was the gladdest kind of man to see him clear away.  It
ain’t my notion to turn my back on a mate when he’s in a tight place, but
there was that much trouble in the village that I couldn’t see where it
might likely end.  I was a fool to be so much about with Vigours.  They
cast it up to me to-day.  Didn’t you hear Maea—that’s the young chief,
the big one—ripping out about ‘Vika’?  That was him they were after.
They don’t seem to forget it, somehow.”

“This is all very well,” said I, “but it don’t tell me what’s wrong; it
don’t tell me what they’re afraid of—what their idea is.”

“Well, I wish I knew,” said Case.  “I can’t say fairer than that.”

“You might have asked, I think,” says I.

“And so I did,” says he.  “But you must have seen for yourself, unless
you’re blind, that the asking got the other way.  I’ll go as far as I
dare for another white man; but when I find I’m in the scrape myself, I
think first of my own bacon.  The loss of me is I’m too good-natured.
And I’ll take the freedom of telling you you show a queer kind of
gratitude to a man who’s got into all this mess along of your affairs.”

“There’s a thing I am thinking of,” said I.  “You were a fool to be so
much about with Vigours.  One comfort, you haven’t been much about with
me.  I notice you’ve never been inside my house.  Own up now; you had
word of this before?”

“It’s a fact I haven’t been,” said he.  “It was an oversight, and I am
sorry for it, Wiltshire.  But about coming now, I’ll be quite plain.”

“You mean you won’t?” I asked.

“Awfully sorry, old man, but that’s the size of it,” says Case.

“In short, you’re afraid?” says I.

“In short, I’m afraid,” says he.

“And I’m still to be tabooed for nothing?” I asked

“I tell you you’re not tabooed,” said he.  “The Kanakas won’t go near
you, that’s all.  And who’s to make ’em?  We traders have a lot of gall,
I must say; we make these poor Kanakas take back their laws, and take up
their taboos, and that, whenever it happens to suit us.  But you don’t
mean to say you expect a law obliging people to deal in your store
whether they want to or not?  You don’t mean to tell me you’ve got the
gall for that?  And if you had, it would be a queer thing to propose to
me.  I would just like to point out to you, Wiltshire, that I’m a trader
myself.”

“I don’t think I would talk of gall if I was you,” said I.  “Here’s about
what it comes to, as well as I can make out: None of the people are to
trade with me, and they’re all to trade with you.  You’re to have the
copra, and I’m to go to the devil and shake myself.  And I don’t know any
native, and you’re the only man here worth mention that speaks English,
and you have the gall to up and hint to me my life’s in danger, and all
you’ve got to tell me is you don’t know why!”

“Well, it _is_ all I have to tell you,” said he.  “I don’t know—I wish I
did.”

“And so you turn your back and leave me to myself!  Is that the
position?” says I.

“If you like to put it nasty,” says he.  “I don’t put it so.  I say
merely, ‘I’m going to keep clear of you; or, if I don’t, I’ll get in
danger for myself.’”

“Well,” says I, “you’re a nice kind of a white man!”

“O, I understand; you’re riled,” said he.  “I would be myself.  I can
make excuses.”

“All right,” I said, “go and make excuses somewhere else.  Here’s my way,
there’s yours!”

With that we parted, and I went straight home, in a hot temper, and found
Uma trying on a lot of trade goods like a baby.

“Here,” I said, “you quit that foolery!  Here’s a pretty mess to have
made, as if I wasn’t bothered enough anyway!  And I thought I told you to
get dinner!”

And then I believe I gave her a bit of the rough side of my tongue, as
she deserved.  She stood up at once, like a sentry to his officer; for I
must say she was always well brought up, and had a great respect for
whites.

“And now,” says I, “you belong round here, you’re bound to understand
this.  What am I tabooed for, anyway?  Or, if I ain’t tabooed, what makes
the folks afraid of me?”

She stood and looked at me with eyes like saucers.

“You no savvy?” she gasps at last.

“No,” said I.  “How would you expect me to?  We don’t have any such
craziness where I come from.”

“Ese no tell you?” she asked again.

(_Ese_ was the name the natives had for Case; it may mean foreign, or
extraordinary; or it might mean a mummy apple; but most like it was only
his own name misheard and put in a Kanaka spelling.)

“Not much,” said I.

“D-n Ese!” she cried.

You might think it funny to hear this Kanaka girl come out with a big
swear.  No such thing.  There was no swearing in her—no, nor anger; she
was beyond anger, and meant the word simple and serious.  She stood there
straight as she said it.  I cannot justly say that I ever saw a woman
look like that before or after, and it struck me mum.  Then she made a
kind of an obeisance, but it was the proudest kind, and threw her hands
out open.

“I ’shamed,” she said.  “I think you savvy.  Ese he tell me you savvy, he
tell me you no mind, tell me you love me too much.  Taboo belong me,” she
said, touching herself on the bosom, as she had done upon our
wedding-night.  “Now I go ’way, taboo he go ’way too.  Then you get too
much copra.  You like more better, I think.  _Tofâ_, _alii_,” says she in
the native—“Farewell, chief!”

“Hold on!” I cried.  “Don’t be in such a hurry.”

She looked at me sidelong with a smile.  “You see, you get copra,” she
said, the same as you might offer candies to a child.

“Uma,” said I, “hear reason.  I didn’t know, and that’s a fact; and Case
seems to have played it pretty mean upon the pair of us.  But I do know
now, and I don’t mind; I love you too much.  You no go ’way, you no leave
me, I too much sorry.”

“You no love, me,” she cried, “you talk me bad words!”  And she threw
herself in a corner of the floor, and began to cry.

Well, I’m no scholar, but I wasn’t born yesterday, and I thought the
worst of that trouble was over.  However, there she lay—her back turned,
her face to the wall—and shook with sobbing like a little child, so that
her feet jumped with it.  It’s strange how it hits a man when he’s in
love; for there’s no use mincing things—Kanaka and all, I was in love
with her, or just as good.  I tried to take her hand, but she would none
of that.  “Uma,” I said, “there’s no sense in carrying on like this.  I
want you stop here, I want my little wifie, I tell you true.”

“No tell me true,” she sobbed.

“All right,” says I, “I’ll wait till you’re through with this.”  And I
sat right down beside her on the floor, and set to smooth her hair with
my hand.  At first she wriggled away when I touched her; then she seemed
to notice me no more; then her sobs grew gradually less, and presently
stopped; and the next thing I knew, she raised her face to mime.

“You tell me true?  You like me stop?” she asked.

“Uma,” I said, “I would rather have you than all the copra in the South
Seas,” which was a very big expression, and the strangest thing was that
I meant it.

She threw her arms about me, sprang close up, and pressed her face to
mine in the island way of kissing, so that I was all wetted with her
tears, and my heart went out to her wholly.  I never had anything so near
me as this little brown bit of a girl.  Many things went together, and
all helped to turn my head.  She was pretty enough to eat; it seemed she
was my only friend in that queer place; I was ashamed that I had spoken
rough to her: and she was a woman, and my wife, and a kind of a baby
besides that I was sorry for; and the salt of her tears was in my mouth.
And I forgot Case and the natives; and I forgot that I knew nothing of
the story, or only remembered it to banish the remembrance; and I forgot
that I was to get no copra, and so could make no livelihood; and I forgot
my employers, and the strange kind of service I was doing them, when I
preferred my fancy to their business; and I forgot even that Uma was no
true wife of mine, but just a maid beguiled, and that in a pretty shabby
style.  But that is to look too far on.  I will come to that part of it
next.

It was late before we thought of getting dinner.  The stove was out, and
gone stone-cold; but we fired up after a while, and cooked each a dish,
helping and hindering each other, and making a play of it like children.
I was so greedy of her nearness that I sat down to dinner with my lass
upon my knee, made sure of her with one hand, and ate with the other.
Ay, and more than that.  She was the worst cook I suppose God made; the
things she set her hand to it would have sickened an honest horse to eat
of; yet I made my meal that day on Uma’s cookery, and can never call to
mind to have been better pleased.

I didn’t pretend to myself, and I didn’t pretend to her.  I saw I was
clean gone; and if she was to make a fool of me, she must.  And I suppose
it was this that set her talking, for now she made sure that we were
friends.  A lot she told me, sitting in my lap and eating my dish, as I
ate hers, from foolery—a lot about herself and her mother and Case, all
which would be very tedious, and fill sheets if I set it down in Beach de
Mar, but which I must give a hint of in plain English, and one thing
about myself which had a very big effect on my concerns, as you are soon
to hear.

It seems she was born in one of the Line Islands; had been only two or
three years in these parts, where she had come with a white man, who was
married to her mother and then died; and only the one year in Falesá.
Before that they had been a good deal on the move, trekking about after
the white man, who was one of those rolling stones that keep going round
after a soft job.  They talk about looking for gold at the end of a
rainbow; but if a man wants an employment that’ll last him till he dies,
let him start out on the soft-job hunt.  There’s meat and drink in it
too, and beer and skittles, for you never hear of them starving, and
rarely see them sober; and as for steady sport, cock-fighting isn’t in
the same county with it.  Anyway, this beachcomber carried the woman and
her daughter all over the shop, but mostly to out-of-the-way islands,
where there were no police, and he thought, perhaps, the soft job hung
out.  I’ve my own view of this old party; but I was just as glad he had
kept Uma clear of Apia and Papeete and these flash towns.  At last he
struck Fale-alii on this island, got some trade—the Lord knows
how!—muddled it all away in the usual style, and died worth next to
nothing, bar a bit of land at Falesá that he had got for a bad debt,
which was what put it in the minds of the mother and daughter to come
there and live.  It seems Case encouraged them all he could, and helped
to get their house built.  He was very kind those days, and gave Uma
trade, and there is no doubt he had his eye on her from the beginning.
However, they had scarce settled, when up turned a young man, a native,
and wanted to marry her.  He was a small chief, and had some fine mats
and old songs in his family, and was “very pretty,” Uma said; and,
altogether, it was an extraordinary match for a penniless girl and an
out-islander.

At the first word of this I got downright sick with jealousy.

“And you mean to say you would have married him?” I cried.

“_Ioe_, yes,” said she.  “I like too much!”

“Well!” I said.  “And suppose I had come round after?”

“I like you more better now,” said she.  “But, suppose I marry Ioane, I
one good wife.  I no common Kanaka.  Good girl!” says she.

Well, I had to be pleased with that; but I promise you I didn’t care
about the business one little bit.  And I liked the end of that yarn no
better than the beginning.  For it seems this proposal of marriage was
the start of all the trouble.  It seems, before that, Uma and her mother
had been looked down upon, of course, for kinless folk and out-islanders,
but nothing to hurt; and, even when Ioane came forward, there was less
trouble at first than might have been looked for.  And then, all of a
sudden, about six months before my coming, Ioane backed out and left that
part of the island, and from that day to this Uma and her mother had
found themselves alone.  None called at their house, none spoke to them
on the roads.  If they went to church, the other women drew their mats
away and left them in a clear place by themselves.  It was a regular
excommunication, like what you read of in the Middle Ages; and the cause
or sense of it beyond guessing.  It was some _tala pepelo_, Uma said,
some lie, some calumny; and all she knew of it was that the girls who had
been jealous of her luck with Ioane used to twit her with his desertion,
and cry out, when they met her alone in the woods, that she would never
be married.  “They tell me no man he marry me.  He too much ’fraid,” she
said.

The only soul that came about them after this desertion was Master Case.
Even he was chary of showing himself, and turned up mostly by night; and
pretty soon he began to table his cards and make up to Uma.  I was still
sore about Ioane, and when Case turned up in the same line of business I
cut up downright rough.

“Well,” I said, sneering, “and I suppose you thought Case ‘very pretty’
and ‘liked too much’?”

“Now you talk silly,” said she.  “White man, he come here, I marry him
all-e-same Kanaka; very well then, he marry me all-e-same white woman.
Suppose he no marry, he go ’way, woman he stop.  All-e-same thief, empty
hand, Tonga-heart—no can love!  Now you come marry me.  You big heart—you
no ’shamed island-girl.  That thing I love you for too much.  I proud.”

I don’t know that ever I felt sicker all the days of my life.  I laid
down my fork, and I put away “the island-girl”; I didn’t seem somehow to
have any use for either, and I went and walked up and down in the house,
and Uma followed me with her eyes, for she was troubled, and small
wonder!  But troubled was no word for it with me.  I so wanted, and so
feared, to make a clean breast of the sweep that I had been.

And just then there came a sound of singing out of the sea; it sprang up
suddenly clear and near, as the boat turned the headland, and Uma,
running to the window, cried out it was “Misi” come upon his rounds.

I thought it was a strange thing I should be glad to have a missionary;
but, if it was strange, it was still true.

“Uma,” said I, “you stop here in this room, and don’t budge a foot out of
it till I come back.”



CHAPTER III.  THE MISSIONARY.


As I came out on the verandah, the mission-boat was shooting for the
mouth of the river.  She was a long whale-boat painted white; a bit of an
awning astern; a native pastor crouched on the wedge of the poop,
steering; some four-and-twenty paddles flashing and dipping, true to the
boat-song; and the missionary under the awning, in his white clothes,
reading in a book, and set him up!  It was pretty to see and hear;
there’s no smarter sight in the islands than a missionary boat with a
good crew and a good pipe to them; and I considered it for half a minute,
with a bit of envy perhaps, and then strolled down towards the river.

From the opposite side there was another man aiming for the same place,
but he ran and got there first.  It was Case; doubtless his idea was to
keep me apart from the missionary, who might serve me as interpreter; but
my mind was upon other things.  I was thinking how he had jockeyed us
about the marriage, and tried his hand on Uma before; and at the sight of
him rage flew into my nostrils.

“Get out of that, you low, swindling thief!”  I cried.

“What’s that you say?” says he.

I gave him the word again, and rammed it down with a good oath.  “And if
ever I catch you within six fathoms of my house,” I cried, “I’ll clap a
bullet in your measly carcase.”

“You must do as you like about your house,” said he, “where I told you I
have no thought of going; but this is a public place.”

“It’s a place where I have private business,” said I.  “I have no idea of
a hound like you eavesdropping, and I give you notice to clear out.”

“I don’t take it, though,” says Case.

“I’ll show you, then,” said I.

“We’ll have to see about that,” said he.

He was quick with his hands, but he had neither the height nor the
weight, being a flimsy creature alongside a man like me, and, besides, I
was blazing to that height of wrath that I could have bit into a chisel.
I gave him first the one and then the other, so that I could hear his
head rattle and crack, and he went down straight.

“Have you had enough?” cried I.  But he only looked up white and blank,
and the blood spread upon his face like wine upon a napkin.  “Have you
had enough?” I cried again.  “Speak up, and don’t lie malingering there,
or I’ll take my feet to you.”

He sat up at that, and held his head—by the look of him you could see it
was spinning—and the blood poured on his pyjamas.

“I’ve had enough for this time,” says he, and he got up staggering, and
went off by the way that he had come.

The boat was close in; I saw the missionary had laid his book to one
side, and I smiled to myself.  “He’ll know I’m a man, anyway,” thinks I.

This was the first time, in all my years in the Pacific, I had ever
exchanged two words with any missionary, let alone asked one for a
favour.  I didn’t like the lot, no trader does; they look down upon us,
and make no concealment; and, besides, they’re partly Kanakaised, and
suck up with natives instead of with other white men like themselves.  I
had on a rig of clean striped pyjamas—for, of course, I had dressed
decent to go before the chiefs; but when I saw the missionary step out of
this boat in the regular uniform, white duck clothes, pith helmet, white
shirt and tie, and yellow boots to his feet, I could have bunged stones
at him.  As he came nearer, queering me pretty curious (because of the
fight, I suppose), I saw he looked mortal sick, for the truth was he had
a fever on, and had just had a chill in the boat.

“Mr. Tarleton, I believe?” says I, for I had got his name.

“And you, I suppose, are the new trader?” says he.

“I want to tell you first that I don’t hold with missions,” I went on,
“and that I think you and the likes of you do a sight of harm, filling up
the natives with old wives’ tales and bumptiousness.”

“You are perfectly entitled to your opinions,” says he, looking a bit
ugly, “but I have no call to hear them.”

“It so happens that you’ve got to hear them,” I said.  “I’m no
missionary, nor missionary lover; I’m no Kanaka, nor favourer of
Kanakas—I’m just a trader; I’m just a common, low-down, God-damned white
man and British subject, the sort you would like to wipe your boots on.
I hope that’s plain!”

“Yes, my man,” said he.  “It’s more plain than creditable.  When you are
sober, you’ll be sorry for this.”

He tried to pass on, but I stopped him with my hand.  The Kanakas were
beginning to growl.  Guess they didn’t like my tone, for I spoke to that
man as free as I would to you.

“Now, you can’t say I’ve deceived you,” said I, “and I can go on.  I want
a service—I want two services, in fact; and, if you care to give me them,
I’ll perhaps take more stock in what you call your Christianity.”

He was silent for a moment.  Then he smiled.  “You are rather a strange
sort of man,” says he.

“I’m the sort of man God made me,” says I.  “I don’t set up to be a
gentleman,” I said.

“I am not quite so sure,” said he.  “And what can I do for you, Mr.—?”

“Wiltshire,” I says, “though I’m mostly called Welsher; but Wiltshire is
the way it’s spelt, if the people on the beach could only get their
tongues about it.  And what do I want?  Well, I’ll tell you the first
thing.  I’m what you call a sinner—what I call a sweep—and I want you to
help me make it up to a person I’ve deceived.”

He turned and spoke to his crew in the native.  “And now I am at your
service,” said he, “but only for the time my crew are dining.  I must be
much farther down the coast before night.  I was delayed at Papa-Malulu
till this morning, and I have an engagement in Fale-alii to-morrow
night.”

I led the way to my house in silence, and rather pleased with myself for
the way I had managed the talk, for I like a man to keep his
self-respect.

“I was sorry to see you fighting,” says he.

“O, that’s part of the yarn I want to tell you,” I said.  “That’s service
number two.  After you’ve heard it you’ll let me know whether you’re
sorry or not.”

We walked right in through the store, and I was surprised to find Uma had
cleared away the dinner things.  This was so unlike her ways that I saw
she had done it out of gratitude, and liked her the better.  She and Mr.
Tarleton called each other by name, and he was very civil to her
seemingly.  But I thought little of that; they can always find civility
for a Kanaka, it’s us white men they lord it over.  Besides, I didn’t
want much Tarleton just them.  I was going to do my pitch.

“Uma,” said I, “give us your marriage certificate.”  She looked put out.
“Come,” said I, “you can trust me.  Hand it up.”

She had it about her person, as usual; I believe she thought it was a
pass to heaven, and if she died without having it handy she would go to
hell.  I couldn’t see where she put it the first time, I couldn’t see now
where she took it from; it seemed to jump into her hand like that
Blavatsky business in the papers.  But it’s the same way with all island
women, and I guess they’re taught it when young.

“Now,” said I, with the certificate in my hand, “I was married to this
girl by Black Jack the negro.  The certificate was wrote by Case, and
it’s a dandy piece of literature, I promise you.  Since then I’ve found
that there’s a kind of cry in the place against this wife of mine, and so
long as I keep her I cannot trade.  Now, what would any man do in my
place, if he was a man?” I said.  “The first thing he would do is this, I
guess.”  And I took and tore up the certificate and bunged the pieces on
the floor.

“_Aué_!” {2} cried Uma, and began to clap her hands; but I caught one of
them in mine.

“And the second thing that he would do,” said I, “if he was what I would
call a man and you would call a man, Mr. Tarleton, is to bring the girl
right before you or any other missionary, and to up and say: ‘I was wrong
married to this wife of mine, but I think a heap of her, and now I want
to be married to her right.’  Fire away, Mr. Tarleton.  And I guess you’d
better do it in native; it’ll please the old lady,” I said, giving her
the proper name of a man’s wife upon the spot.

So we had in two of the crew for to witness, and were spliced in our own
house; and the parson prayed a good bit, I must say—but not so long as
some—and shook hands with the pair of us.

“Mr. Wiltshire,” he says, when he had made out the lines and packed off
the witnesses, “I have to thank you for a very lively pleasure.  I have
rarely performed the marriage ceremony with more grateful emotions.”

That was what you would call talking.  He was going on, besides, with
more of it, and I was ready for as much taffy as he had in stock, for I
felt good.  But Uma had been taken up with something half through the
marriage, and cut straight in.

“How your hand he get hurt?” she asked.

“You ask Case’s head, old lady,” says I.

She jumped with joy, and sang out.

“You haven’t made much of a Christian of this one,” says I to Mr.
Tarleton.

“We didn’t think her one of our worst,” says he, “when she was at
Fale-alii; and if Uma bears malice I shall be tempted to fancy she has
good cause.”

“Well, there we are at service number two,” said I.  “I want to tell you
our yarn, and see if you can let a little daylight in.”

“Is it long?” he asked.

“Yes,” I cried; “it’s a goodish bit of a yarn!”

“Well, I’ll give you all the time I can spare,” says he, looking at his
watch.  “But I must tell you fairly, I haven’t eaten since five this
morning, and, unless you can let me have something I am not likely to eat
again before seven or eight to-night.”

“By God, we’ll give you dinner!” I cried.

I was a little caught up at my swearing, just when all was going
straight; and so was the missionary, I suppose, but he made believe to
look out of the window, and thanked us.

So we ran him up a bit of a meal.  I was bound to let the old lady have a
hand in it, to show off, so I deputised her to brew the tea.  I don’t
think I ever met such tea as she turned out.  But that was not the worst,
for she got round with the salt-box, which she considered an extra
European touch, and turned my stew into sea-water.  Altogether, Mr.
Tarleton had a devil of a dinner of it; but he had plenty entertainment
by the way, for all the while that we were cooking, and afterwards, when
he was making believe to eat, I kept posting him up on Master Case and
the beach of Falesá, and he putting questions that showed he was
following close.

“Well,” said he at last, “I am afraid you have a dangerous enemy.  This
man Case is very clever and seems really wicked.  I must tell you I have
had my eye on him for nearly a year, and have rather had the worst of our
encounters.  About the time when the last representative of your firm ran
so suddenly away, I had a letter from Namu, the native pastor, begging me
to come to Falesá at my earliest convenience, as his flock were all
‘adopting Catholic practices.’  I had great confidence in Namu; I fear it
only shows how easily we are deceived.  No one could hear him preach and
not be persuaded he was a man of extraordinary parts.  All our islanders
easily acquire a kind of eloquence, and can roll out and illustrate, with
a great deal of vigour and fancy, second-hand sermons; but Namu’s sermons
are his own, and I cannot deny that I have found them means of grace.
Moreover, he has a keen curiosity in secular things, does not fear work,
is clever at carpentering, and has made himself so much respected among
the neighbouring pastors that we call him, in a jest which is half
serious, the Bishop of the East.  In short, I was proud of the man; all
the more puzzled by his letter, and took an occasion to come this way.
The morning before my arrival, Vigours had been sent on board the _Lion_,
and Namu was perfectly at his ease, apparently ashamed of his letter, and
quite unwilling to explain it.  This, of course, I could not allow, and
he ended by confessing that he had been much concerned to find his people
using the sign of the cross, but since he had learned the explanation his
mind was satisfied.  For Vigours had the Evil Eye, a common thing in a
country of Europe called Italy, where men were often struck dead by that
kind of devil, and it appeared the sign of the cross was a charm against
its power.

“‘And I explain it, Misi,’ said Namu, ‘in this way: The country in Europe
is a Popey country, and the devil of the Evil Eye may be a Catholic
devil, or, at least, used to Catholic ways.  So then I reasoned thus: if
this sign of the cross were used in a Popey manner it would be sinful,
but when it is used only to protect men from a devil, which is a thing
harmless in itself, the sign too must be, as a bottle is neither good nor
bad, harmless.  For the sign is neither good nor bad.  But if the bottle
be full of gin, the gin is bad; and if the sign be made in idolatry bad,
so is the idolatry.’  And, very like a native pastor, he had a text
apposite about the casting out of devils.

“‘And who has been telling you about the Evil Eye?’ I asked.

“He admitted it was Case.  Now, I am afraid you will think me very
narrow, Mr. Wiltshire, but I must tell you I was displeased, and cannot
think a trader at all a good man to advise or have an influence upon my
pastors.  And, besides, there had been some flying talk in the country of
old Adams and his being poisoned, to which I had paid no great heed; but
it came back to me at the moment.

“‘And is this Case a man of a sanctified life?’ I asked.

“He admitted he was not; for, though he did not drink, he was profligate
with women, and had no religion.

“‘Then,’ said I, ‘I think the less you have to do with him the better.’

“But it is not easy to have the last word with a man like Namu.  He was
ready in a moment with an illustration.  ‘Misi,’ said he, ‘you have told
me there were wise men, not pastors, not even holy, who knew many things
useful to be taught—about trees for instance, and beasts, and to print
books, and about the stones that are burned to make knives of.  Such men
teach you in your college, and you learn from them, but take care not to
learn to be unholy.  Misi, Case is my college.’

“I knew not what to say.  Mr. Vigours had evidently been driven out of
Falesá by the machinations of Case and with something not very unlike the
collusion of my pastor.  I called to mind it was Namu who had reassured
me about Adams and traced the rumour to the ill-will of the priest.  And
I saw I must inform myself more thoroughly from an impartial source.
There is an old rascal of a chief here, Faiaso, whom I dare say you saw
to-day at the council; he has been all his life turbulent and sly, a
great fomenter of rebellions, and a thorn in the side of the mission and
the island.  For all that he is very shrewd, and, except in politics or
about his own misdemeanours, a teller of the truth.  I went to his house,
told him what I had heard, and besought him to be frank.  I do not think
I had ever a more painful interview.  Perhaps you will understand me, Mr.
Wiltshire, if I tell you that I am perfectly serious in these old wives’
tales with which you reproached me, and as anxious to do well for these
islands as you can be to please and to protect your pretty wife.  And you
are to remember that I thought Namu a paragon, and was proud of the man
as one of the first ripe fruits of the mission.  And now I was informed
that he had fallen in a sort of dependence upon Case.  The beginning of
it was not corrupt; it began, doubtless, in fear and respect, produced by
trickery and pretence; but I was shocked to find that another element had
been lately added, that Namu helped himself in the store, and was
believed to be deep in Case’s debt.  Whatever the trader said, that Namu
believed with trembling.  He was not alone in this; many in the village
lived in a similar subjection; but Namu’s case was the most influential,
it was through Namu Case had wrought most evil; and with a certain
following among the chiefs, and the pastor in his pocket, the man was as
good as master of the village.  You know something of Vigours and Adams,
but perhaps you have never heard of old Underhill, Adams’ predecessor.
He was a quiet, mild old fellow, I remember, and we were told he had died
suddenly: white men die very suddenly in Falesá.  The truth, as I now
heard it, made my blood run cold.  It seems he was struck with a general
palsy, all of him dead but one eye, which he continually winked.  Word
was started that the helpless old man was now a devil, and this vile
fellow Case worked upon the natives’ fears, which he professed to share,
and pretended he durst not go into the house alone.  At last a grave was
dug, and the living body buried at the far end of the village.  Namu, my
pastor, whom I had helped to educate, offered up a prayer at the hateful
scene.

“I felt myself in a very difficult position.  Perhaps it was my duty to
have denounced Namu and had him deposed.  Perhaps I think so now, but at
the time it seemed less clear.  He had a great influence, it might prove
greater than mine.  The natives are prone to superstition; perhaps by
stirring them up I might but ingrain and spread these dangerous fancies.
And Namu besides, apart from this novel and accursed influence, was a
good pastor, an able man, and spiritually minded.  Where should I look
for a better?  How was I to find as good?  At that moment, with Namu’s
failure fresh in my view, the work of my life appeared a mockery; hope
was dead in me.  I would rather repair such tools as I had than go abroad
in quest of others that must certainly prove worse; and a scandal is, at
the best, a thing to be avoided when humanly possible.  Right or wrong,
then, I determined on a quiet course.  All that night I denounced and
reasoned with the erring pastor, twitted him with his ignorance and want
of faith, twitted him with his wretched attitude, making clean the
outside of the cup and platter, callously helping at a murder, childishly
flying in excitement about a few childish, unnecessary, and inconvenient
gestures; and long before day I had him on his knees and bathed in the
tears of what seemed a genuine repentance.  On Sunday I took the pulpit
in the morning, and preached from First Kings, nineteenth, on the fire,
the earthquake, and the voice, distinguishing the true spiritual power,
and referring with such plainness as I dared to recent events in Falesá.
The effect produced was great, and it was much increased when Namu rose
in his turn and confessed that he had been wanting in faith and conduct,
and was convinced of sin.  So far, then, all was well; but there was one
unfortunate circumstance.  It was nearing the time of our ‘May’ in the
island, when the native contributions to the missions are received; it
fell in my duty to make a notification on the subject, and this gave my
enemy his chance, by which he was not slow to profit.

“News of the whole proceedings must have been carried to Case as soon as
church was over, and the same afternoon he made an occasion to meet me in
the midst of the village.  He came up with so much intentness and
animosity that I felt it would be damaging to avoid him.

“‘So,’ says he, in native, ‘here is the holy man.  He has been preaching
against me, but that was not in his heart.  He has been preaching upon
the love of God; but that was not in his heart, it was between his teeth.
Will you know what was in his heart?’—cries he.  ‘I will show it you!’
And, making a snatch at my head, he made believe to pluck out a dollar,
and held it in the air.

“There went that rumour through the crowd with which Polynesians receive
a prodigy.  As for myself, I stood amazed.  The thing was a common
conjuring trick which I have seen performed at home a score of times; but
how was I to convince the villagers of that?  I wished I had learned
legerdemain instead of Hebrew, that I might have paid the fellow out with
his own coin.  But there I was; I could not stand there silent, and the
best I could find to say was weak.

“‘I will trouble you not to lay hands on me again,’ said I.

“‘I have no such thought,’ said he, ‘nor will I deprive you of your
dollar.  Here it is,’ he said, and flung it at my feet.  I am told it lay
where it fell three days.”

“I must say it was well played, said I.

“O! he is clever,” said Mr. Tarleton, “and you can now see for yourself
how dangerous.  He was a party to the horrid death of the paralytic; he
is accused of poisoning Adams; he drove Vigours out of the place by lies
that might have led to murder; and there is no question but he has now
made up his mind to rid himself of you.  How he means to try we have no
guess; only be sure, it’s something new.  There is no end to his
readiness and invention.”

“He gives himself a sight of trouble,” says I.  “And after all, what
for?”

“Why, how many tons of copra may they make in this district?” asked the
missionary.

“I daresay as much as sixty tons,” says I.

“And what is the profit to the local trader?” he asked.

“You may call it, three pounds,” said I.

“Then you can reckon for yourself how much he does it for,” said Mr.
Tarleton.  “But the more important thing is to defeat him.  It is clear
he spread some report against Uma, in order to isolate and have his
wicked will of her.  Failing of that, and seeing a new rival come upon
the scene, he used her in a different way.  Now, the first point to find
out is about Namu.  Uma, when people began to leave you and your mother
alone, what did Namu do?”

“Stop away all-e-same,” says Uma.

“I fear the dog has returned to his vomit,” said Mr. Tarleton.  “And now
what am I to do for you?  I will speak to Namu, I will warn him he is
observed; it will be strange if he allow anything to go on amiss when he
is put upon his guard.  At the same time, this precaution may fail, and
then you must turn elsewhere.  You have two people at hand to whom you
might apply.  There is, first of all, the priest, who might protect you
by the Catholic interest; they are a wretchedly small body, but they
count two chiefs.  And then there is old Faiaso.  Ah! if it had been some
years ago you would have needed no one else; but his influence is much
reduced, it has gone into Maea’s hands, and Maea, I fear, is one of
Case’s jackals.  In fine, if the worst comes to the worst, you must send
up or come yourself to Fale-alii, and, though I am not due at this end of
the island for a month, I will just see what can be done.”

So Mr. Tarleton said farewell; and half an hour later the crew were
singing and the paddles flashing in the missionary-boat.



CHAPTER IV.  DEVIL-WORK.


Near a month went by without much doing.  The same night of our marriage
Galoshes called round, and made himself mighty civil, and got into a
habit of dropping in about dark and smoking his pipe with the family.  He
could talk to Uma, of course, and started to teach me native and French
at the same time.  He was a kind old buffer, though the dirtiest you
would wish to see, and he muddled me up with foreign languages worse than
the tower of Babel.

That was one employment we had, and it made me feel less lonesome; but
there was no profit in the thing, for though the priest came and sat and
yarned, none of his folks could be enticed into my store; and if it
hadn’t been for the other occupation I struck out, there wouldn’t have
been a pound of copra in the house.  This was the idea: Fa’avao (Uma’s
mother) had a score of bearing trees.  Of course we could get no labour,
being all as good as tabooed, and the two women and I turned to and made
copra with our own hands.  It was copra to make your mouth water when it
was done—I never understood how much the natives cheated me till I had
made that four hundred pounds of my own hand—and it weighed so light I
felt inclined to take and water it myself.

When we were at the job a good many Kanakas used to put in the best of
the day looking on, and once that nigger turned up.  He stood back with
the natives and laughed and did the big don and the funny dog, till I
began to get riled.

“Here, you nigger!” says I.

“I don’t address myself to you, Sah,” says the nigger.  “Only speak to
gen’le’um.”

“I know,” says I, “but it happens I was addressing myself to you, Mr.
Black Jack.  And all I want to know is just this: did you see Case’s
figurehead about a week ago?”

“No, Sah,” says he.

“That’s all right, then,” says I; “for I’ll show you the own brother to
it, only black, in the inside of about two minutes.”

And I began to walk towards him, quite slow, and my hands down; only
there was trouble in my eye, if anybody took the pains to look.

“You’re a low, obstropulous fellow, Sah,” says he.

“You bet!” says I.

By that time he thought I was about as near as convenient, and lit out so
it would have done your heart good to see him travel.  And that was all I
saw of that precious gang until what I am about to tell you.

It was one of my chief employments these days to go pot-hunting in the
woods, which I found (as Case had told me) very rich in game.  I have
spoken of the cape which shut up the village and my station from the
east.  A path went about the end of it, and led into the next bay.  A
strong wind blew here daily, and as the line of the barrier reef stopped
at the end of the cape, a heavy surf ran on the shores of the bay.  A
little cliffy hill cut the valley in two parts, and stood close on the
beach; and at high water the sea broke right on the face of it, so that
all passage was stopped.  Woody mountains hemmed the place all round; the
barrier to the east was particularly steep and leafy, the lower parts of
it, along the sea, falling in sheer black cliffs streaked with cinnabar;
the upper part lumpy with the tops of the great trees.  Some of the trees
were bright green, and some red, and the sand of the beach as black as
your shoes.  Many birds hovered round the bay, some of them snow-white;
and the flying-fox (or vampire) flew there in broad daylight, gnashing
its teeth.

For a long while I came as far as this shooting, and went no farther.
There was no sign of any path beyond, and the cocoa-palms in the front of
the foot of the valley were the last this way.  For the whole “eye” of
the island, as natives call the windward end, lay desert.  From Falesá
round about to Papa-malulu, there was neither house, nor man, nor planted
fruit-tree; and the reef being mostly absent, and the shores bluff, the
sea beat direct among crags, and there was scarce a landing-place.

I should tell you that after I began to go in the woods, although no one
offered to come near my store, I found people willing enough to pass the
time of day with me where nobody could see them; and as I had begun to
pick up native, and most of them had a word or two of English, I began to
hold little odds and ends of conversation, not to much purpose to be
sure, but they took off the worst of the feeling, for it’s a miserable
thing to be made a leper of.

It chanced one day towards the end of the month, that I was sitting in
this bay in the edge of the bush, looking east, with a Kanaka.  I had
given him a fill of tobacco, and we were making out to talk as best we
could; indeed, he had more English than most.

I asked him if there was no road going eastward.

“One time one road,” said he.  “Now he dead.”

“Nobody he go there?” I asked.

“No good,” said he.  “Too much devil he stop there.”

“Oho!” says I, “got-um plenty devil, that bush?”

“Man devil, woman devil; too much devil,” said my friend.  “Stop there
all-e-time.  Man he go there, no come back.”

I thought if this fellow was so well posted on devils and spoke of them
so free, which is not common, I had better fish for a little information
about myself and Uma.

“You think me one devil?” I asked.

“No think devil,” said he soothingly.  “Think all-e-same fool.”

“Uma, she devil?” I asked again.

“No, no; no devil.  Devil stop bush,” said the young man.

I was looking in front of me across the bay, and I saw the hanging front
of the woods pushed suddenly open, and Case, with a gun in his hand, step
forth into the sunshine on the black beach.  He was got up in light
pyjamas, near white, his gun sparkled, he looked mighty conspicuous; and
the land-crabs scuttled from all round him to their holes.

“Hullo, my friend!” says I, “you no talk all-e-same true.  Ese he go, he
come back.”

“Ese no all-e-same; Ese _Tiapolo_,” says my friend; and, with a
“Good-bye,” slunk off among the trees.

I watched Case all round the beach, where the tide was low; and let him
pass me on the homeward way to Falesá.  He was in deep thought, and the
birds seemed to know it, trotting quite near him on the sand, or wheeling
and calling in his ears.  When he passed me I could see by the working of
his lips that he was talking to himself, and what pleased me mightily, he
had still my trade mark on his brow, I tell you the plain truth: I had a
mind to give him a gunful in his ugly mug, but I thought better of it.

All this time, and all the time I was following home, I kept repeating
that native word, which I remembered by “Polly, put the kettle on and
make us all some tea,” tea-a-pollo.

“Uma,” says I, when I got back, “what does _Tiapolo_ mean?”

“Devil,” says she.

“I thought _aitu_ was the word for that,” I said.

“_Aitu_ ’nother kind of devil,” said she; “stop bush, eat Kanaka.
Tiapolo big chief devil, stop home; all-e-same Christian devil.”

“Well then,” said I, “I’m no farther forward.  How can Case be Tiapolo?”

“No all-e-same,” said she.  “Ese belong Tiapolo; Tiapolo too much like;
Ese all-e-same his son.  Suppose Ese he wish something, Tiapolo he make
him.”

“That’s mighty convenient for Ese,” says I.  “And what kind of things
does he make for him?”

Well, out came a rigmarole of all sorts of stories, many of which (like
the dollar he took from Mr. Tarleton’s head) were plain enough to me, but
others I could make nothing of; and the thing that most surprised the
Kanakas was what surprised me least—namely, that he would go in the
desert among all the _aitus_.  Some of the boldest, however, had
accompanied him, and had heard him speak with the dead and give them
orders, and, safe in his protection, had returned unscathed.  Some said
he had a church there, where he worshipped Tiapolo, and Tiapolo appeared
to him; others swore that there was no sorcery at all, that he performed
his miracles by the power of prayer, and the church was no church, but a
prison, in which he had confined a dangerous _aitu_.  Namu had been in
the bush with him once, and returned glorifying God for these wonders.
Altogether, I began to have a glimmer of the man’s position, and the
means by which he had acquired it, and, though I saw he was a tough nut
to crack, I was noways cast down.

“Very well,” said I, “I’ll have a look at Master Case’s place of worship
myself, and we’ll see about the glorifying.”

At this Uma fell in a terrible taking; if I went in the high bush I
should never return; none could go there but by the protection of
Tiapolo.

“I’ll chance it on God’s,” said I.  “I’m a good sort of a fellow, Uma, as
fellows go, and I guess God’ll con me through.”

She was silent for a while.  “I think,” said she, mighty solemn—and then,
presently—“Victoreea, he big chief?”

“You bet!” said I.

“He like you too much?” she asked again.

I told her, with a grin, I believed the old lady was rather partial to
me.

“All right,” said she.  “Victoreea he big chief, like you too much.  No
can help you here in Falesá; no can do—too far off.  Maea he small
chief—stop here.  Suppose he like you—make you all right.  All-e-same God
and Tiapolo.  God he big chief—got too much work.  Tiapolo he small
chief—he like too much make-see, work very hard.”

“I’ll have to hand you over to Mr. Tarleton,” said I.  “Your theology’s
out of its bearings, Uma.”

However, we stuck to this business all the evening, and, with the stories
she told me of the desert and its dangers, she came near frightening
herself into a fit.  I don’t remember half a quarter of them, of course,
for I paid little heed; but two come back to me kind of clear.

About six miles up the coast there is a sheltered cove they call
_Fanga-anaana_—“the haven full of caves.”  I’ve seen it from the sea
myself, as near as I could get my boys to venture in; and it’s a little
strip of yellow sand.  Black cliffs overhang it, full of the black mouths
of caves; great trees overhang the cliffs, and dangle-down lianas; and in
one place, about the middle, a big brook pours over in a cascade.  Well,
there was a boat going by here, with six young men of Falesá, “all very
pretty,” Uma said, which was the loss of them.  It blew strong, there was
a heavy head sea, and by the time they opened Fanga-anaana, and saw the
white cascade and the shady beach, they were all tired and thirsty, and
their water had run out.  One proposed to land and get a drink, and,
being reckless fellows, they were all of the same mind except the
youngest.  Lotu was his name; he was a very good young gentleman, and
very wise; and he held out that they were crazy, telling them the place
was given over to spirits and devils and the dead, and there were no
living folk nearer than six miles the one way, and maybe twelve the
other.  But they laughed at his words, and, being five to one, pulled in,
beached the boat, and landed.  It was a wonderful pleasant place, Lotu
said, and the water excellent.  They walked round the beach, but could
see nowhere any way to mount the cliffs, which made them easier in their
mind; and at last they sat down to make a meal on the food they had
brought with them.  They were scarce set, when there came out of the
mouth of one of the black caves six of the most beautiful ladies ever
seen: they had flowers in their hair, and the most beautiful breasts, and
necklaces of scarlet seeds; and began to jest with these young gentlemen,
and the young gentlemen to jest back with them, all but Lotu.  As for
Lotu, he saw there could be no living woman in such a place, and ran, and
flung himself in the bottom of the boat, and covered his face, and
prayed.  All the time the business lasted Lotu made one clean break of
prayer, and that was all he knew of it, until his friends came back, and
made him sit up, and they put to sea again out of the bay, which was now
quite desert, and no word of the six ladies.  But, what frightened Lotu
most, not one of the five remembered anything of what had passed, but
they were all like drunken men, and sang and laughed in the boat, and
skylarked.  The wind freshened and came squally, and the sea rose
extraordinary high; it was such weather as any man in the islands would
have turned his back to and fled home to Falesá; but these five were like
crazy folk, and cracked on all sail and drove their boat into the seas.
Lotu went to the bailing; none of the others thought to help him, but
sang and skylarked and carried on, and spoke singular things beyond a
man’s comprehension, and laughed out loud when they said them.  So the
rest of the day Lotu bailed for his life in the bottom of the boat, and
was all drenched with sweat and cold sea-water; and none heeded him.
Against all expectation, they came safe in a dreadful tempest to
Papa-malulu, where the palms were singing out, and the cocoa-nuts flying
like cannon-balls about the village green; and the same night the five
young gentlemen sickened, and spoke never a reasonable word until they
died.