From on deck came the jar of sheet-blocks and the rat-tat-tat ofthe reef-points against the canvas. In the cabin they could feel the_Willi-Waw_ heel, swing into the wind, and right. David Grief stillhesitated. From for'ard came the jerking rattle of headsail halyardsthrough the sheaves. The little vessel heeled, and through the cabinwalls came the gurgle and wash of water.
"Get a move on!" Griffiths cried. "The anchor's out."
The muzzle of the rifle, four feet away, was bearing directly on him,when Grief resolved to act. The rifle wavered as Griffiths kept hisbalance in the uncertain puffs of the first of the wind. Grief tookadvantage of the wavering, made as if to sign the paper, and at the sameinstant, like a cat, exploded into swift and intricate action. As heducked low and leaped forward with his body, his left hand flashed fromunder the screen of the table, and so accurately-timed was the singlestiff pull on the self-cocking trigger that the cartridge discharged asthe muzzle came forward. Not a whit behind was Griffiths. The muzzleof his weapon dropped to meet the ducking body, and, shot at snapdirection, rifle and revolver went off simultaneously.
Grief felt the sting and sear of a bullet across the skin of hisshoulder, and knew that his own shot had missed. His forward rushcarried him to Griffiths before another shot could be fired, both ofwhose arms, still holding the rifle, he locked with a low tackle aboutthe body. He shoved the revolver muzzle, still in his left hand, deepinto the other's abdomen. Under the press of his anger and the sting ofhis abraded skin, Grief's finger was lifting the hammer, when the waveof anger passed and he recollected himself. Down the companion-way cameindignant cries from the Gooma boys in his canoe.
Everything was happening in seconds. There was apparently no pause inhis actions as he gathered Griffiths in his arms and carried him up thesteep steps in a sweeping rush. Out into the blinding glare of sunshinehe came. A black stood grinning at the wheel, and the _Willi-Waw_,heeled over from the wind, was foaming along. Rapidly dropping asternwas his Gooma canoe. Grief turned his head. From amidships, revolver inhand, the mate was springing toward him. With two jumps, still holdingthe helpless Griffiths, Grief leaped to the rail and overboard.
Both men were grappled together as they went down; but Grief, witha quick updraw of his knees to the other's chest, broke the grip andforced him down. With both feet on Griffiths's shoulder, he forced himstill deeper, at the same time driving himself to the surface. Scarcelyhad his head broken into the sunshine when two splashes of water, inquick succession and within a foot of his face, advertised that Jacobsenknew how to handle a revolver. There was a chance for no third shot, forGrief, filling his lungs with air, sank down. Under water he struckout, nor did he come up till he saw the canoe and the bubbling paddlesoverhead. As he climbed aboard, the _Wlli-Waw_ went into the wind tocome about.
"Washee-washee!" Grief cried to his boys. "You fella make-um beach quickfella time!"
In all shamelessness, he turned his back on the battle and ran forcover. The _Willi-Waw_, compelled to deaden way in order to pick up itscaptain, gave Grief his chance for a lead. The canoe struck the beachfull-tilt, with every paddle driving, and they leaped out and ran acrossthe sand for the trees. But before they gained the shelter, three timesthe sand kicked into puffs ahead of them. Then they dove into the greensafety of the jungle.
Grief watched the _Willi-Waw_ haul up close, go out the passage, thenslack its sheets as it headed south with the wind abeam. As it went outof sight past the point he could see the topsail being broken out. Oneof the Gooma boys, a black, nearly fifty years of age, hideously marredand scarred by skin diseases and old wounds, looked up into his face andgrinned.
"My word," the boy commented, "that fella skipper too much cross alongyou."
Grief laughed, and led the way back across the sand to the canoe.
III
How many millions David Grief was worth no man in the Solomons knew, forhis holdings and ventures were everywhere in the great South Pacific.From Samoa to New Guinea and even to the north of the Line hisplantations were scattered. He possessed pearling concessions in thePaumotus. Though his name did not appear, he was in truth the Germancompany that traded in the French Marquesas. His trading stations werein strings in all the groups, and his vessels that operated them weremany. He owned atolls so remote and tiny that his smallest schooners andketches visited the solitary agents but once a year.
In Sydney, on Castlereagh Street, his offices occupied three floors.But he was rarely in those offices. He preferred always to be on the goamongst the islands, nosing out new investments, inspecting and shakingup old ones, and rubbing shoulders with fun and adventure in a thousandstrange guises. He bought the wreck of the great steamship _Gavonne_for a song, and in salving it achieved the impossible and cleaned up aquarter of a million. In the Louisiades he planted the first commercialrubber, and in Bora-Bora he ripped out the South Sea cotton and put thejolly islanders at the work of planting cacao. It was he who took thedeserted island of Lallu-Ka, colonized it with Polynesians from theOntong-Java Atoll, and planted four thousand acres to cocoanuts. And itwas he who reconciled the warring chief-stocks of Tahiti and swung thegreat deal of the phosphate island of Hikihu.
His own vessels recruited his contract labour. They brought SantaCruz boys to the New Hebrides, New Hebrides boys to the Banks, and thehead-hunting cannibals of Malaita to the plantations of New Georgia.From Tonga to the Gilberts and on to the far Louisiades his recruiterscombed the islands for labour. His keels plowed all ocean stretches. Heowned three steamers on regular island runs, though he rarely elected totravel in them, preferring the wilder and more primitive way of wind andsail.
At least forty years of age, he looked no more than thirty. Yetbeachcombers remembered his advent among the islands a score of yearsbefore, at which time the yellow mustache was already budding silkily onhis lip. Unlike other white men in the tropics, he was there because heliked it. His protective skin pigmentation was excellent. He hadbeen born to the sun. One he was in ten thousand in the matter ofsun-resistance. The invisible and high-velocity light waves failed tobore into him. Other white men were pervious. The sun drove throughtheir skins, ripping and smashing tissues and nerves, till they becamesick in mind and body, tossed most of the Decalogue overboard, descendedto beastliness, drank themselves into quick graves, or survived sosavagely that war vessels were sometimes sent to curb their license.
But David Grief was a true son of the sun, and he flourished in all itsways. He merely became browner with the passing of the years, thoughin the brown was the hint of golden tint that glows in the skin of thePolynesian. Yet his blue eyes retained their blue, his mustache itsyellow, and the lines of his face were those which had persisted throughthe centuries in his English race. English he was in blood, yet thosethat thought they knew contended he was at least American born. Unlikethem, he had not come out to the South Seas seeking hearth and saddle ofhis own. In fact, he had brought hearth and saddle with him. His adventhad been in the Paumotus. He arrived on board a tiny schooner yacht,master and owner, a youth questing romance and adventure along thesun-washed path of the tropics. He also arrived in a hurricane, thegiant waves of which deposited him and yacht and all in the thick of acocoanut grove three hundred yards beyond the surf. Six months later hewas rescued by a pearling cutter. But the sun had got into his blood.At Tahiti, instead of taking a steamer home, he bought a schooner,outfitted her with trade-goods and divers, and went for a cruise throughthe Dangerous Archipelago.
As the golden tint burned into his face it poured molten out of the endsof his fingers. His was the golden touch, but he played the game, notfor the gold, but for the game's sake. It was a man's game, the roughcontacts and fierce give and take of the adventurers of his own bloodand of half the bloods of Europe and the rest of the world, and it was agood game; but over and beyond was his love of all the other thingsthat go to make up a South Seas rover's life--the smell of the reef;the infinite exquisiteness of the shoals of living coral in themirror-surfaced lagoons; the crashing sunris
es of raw colours spreadwith lawless cunning; the palm-tufted islets set in turquoise deeps;the tonic wine of the trade-winds; the heave and send of the orderly,crested seas; the moving deck beneath his feet, the straining canvasoverhead; the flower-garlanded, golden-glowing men and maids ofPolynesia, half-children and half-gods; and even the howling savages ofMelanesia, head-hunters and man-eaters, half-devil and all beast.
And so, favoured child of the sun, out of munificence of energy andsheer joy of living, he, the man of many millions, forbore on his farway to play the game with Harrison J. Griffiths for a paltry sum. It washis whim, his desire, his expression of self and of the sun-warmth thatpoured through him. It was fun, a joke, a problem, a bit of play onwhich life was lightly hazarded for the joy of the playing.
IV
The early morning found the _Wonder_ laying close-hauled along the coastof Guadalcanal She moved lazily through the water under the dying breathof the land breeze. To the east, heavy masses of clouds promised arenewal of the southeast trades, accompanied by sharp puffs and rainsqualls. Ahead, laying along the coast on the same course as the_Wonder_, and being slowly overtaken, was a small ketch. It was not the_Willi-Waw_, however, and Captain Ward, on the _Wonder_, putting downhis glasses, named it the _Kauri_.
Grief, just on deck from below, sighed regretfully.
"If it had only been the _Willi-Waw_" he said.
"You do hate to be beaten," Denby, the supercargo, remarkedsympathetically.
"I certainly do." Grief paused and laughed with genuine mirth. "It's myfirm conviction that Griffiths is a rogue, and that he treated me quitescurvily yesterday. 'Sign,' he says, 'sign in full, at the bottom, anddate it,' And Jacobsen, the little rat, stood in with him. It was rankpiracy, the days of Bully Hayes all over again."
"If you weren't my employer, Mr. Grief, I'd like to give you a piece ofmy mind," Captain Ward broke in.
"Go on and spit it out," Grief encouraged.
"Well, then--" The captain hesitated and cleared his throat. "With allthe money you've got, only a fool would take the risk you did with thosetwo curs. What do you do it for?"
"Honestly, I don't know, Captain. I just want to, I suppose. And can yougive any better reason for anything you do?"
"You'll get your bally head shot off some fine day," Captain Wardgrowled in answer, as he stepped to the binnacle and took the bearingof a peak which had just thrust its head through the clouds that coveredGuadalcanar.
The land breeze strengthened in a last effort, and the _Wonder_,slipping swiftly through the water, ranged alongside the _Kauri_ andbegan to go by. Greetings flew back and forth, then David Grief calledout:
"Seen anything of the _Willi-Waw_?"
The captain, slouch-hatted and barelegged, with a rolling twist hitchedthe faded blue _lava-lava_ tighter around his waist and spat tobaccojuice overside.
"Sure," he answered. "Griffiths lay at Savo last night, taking on pigsand yams and filling his water-tanks. Looked like he was going for along cruise, but he said no. Why? Did you want to see him?"
"Yes; but if you see him first don't tell him you've seen me."
The captain nodded and considered, and walked for'ard on his own deck tokeep abreast of the faster vessel.
"Say!" he called. "Jacobsen told me they were coming down this afternoonto Gabera. Said they were going to lay there to-night and take on sweetpotatoes."
"Gabera has the only leading lights in the Solomons," Grief said, whenhis schooner had drawn well ahead. "Is that right, Captain Ward?"
The captain nodded.
"And the little bight just around the point on this side, it's a rottenanchorage, isn't it?"
"No anchorage. All coral patches and shoals, and a bad surf. That'swhere the _Molly_ went to pieces three years ago."
Grief stared straight before him with lustreless eyes for a full minute,as if summoning some vision to his inner sight. Then the corners of hiseyes wrinkled and the ends of his yellow mustache lifted in a smile.
"We'll anchor at Gabera," he said. "And run in close to the little bightthis side. I want you to drop me in a whaleboat as you go by. Also,give me six boys, and serve out rifles. I'll be back on board beforemorning."
The captain's face took on an expression of suspicion, which swiftlyslid into one of reproach.
"Oh, just a little fun, skipper," Grief protested with the apologeticair of a schoolboy caught in mischief by an elder.
Captain Ward grunted, but Denby was all alertness.
"I'd like to go along, Mr. Grief," he said.
Grief nodded consent.
"Bring some axes and bush-knives," he said. "And, oh, by the way, acouple of bright lanterns. See they've got oil in them."
V
An hour before sunset the _Wonder_ tore by the little bight. The windhad freshened, and a lively sea was beginning to make. The shoalstoward the beach were already white with the churn of water, while thosefarther out as yet showed no more sign than of discoloured water. Asthe schooner went into the wind and backed her jib and staysail thewhaleboat was swung out. Into it leaped six breech-clouted Santa Cruzboys, each armed with a rifle. Denby, carrying the lanterns, droppedinto the stern-sheets. Grief, following, paused on the rail.
"Pray for a dark night, skipper," he pleaded.
"You'll get it," Captain Ward answered. "There's no moon anyway, andthere won't be any sky. She'll be a bit squally, too."
The forecast sent a radiance into Grief's face, making more pronouncedthe golden tint of his sunburn. He leaped down beside the supercargo.
"Cast off!" Captain Ward ordered. "Draw the headsails! Put your wheelover! There! Steady! Take that course!"
The _Wonder_ filled away and ran on around the point for Gabera, whilethe whaleboat, pulling six oars and steered by Grief, headed for thebeach. With superb boatmanship he threaded the narrow, tortuous channelwhich no craft larger than a whaleboat could negotiate, until the shoalsand patches showed seaward and they grounded on the quiet, ripplingbeach.
The next hour was filled with work. Moving about among the wildcocoanuts and jungle brush, Grief selected the trees.
"Chop this fella tree; chop that fella tree," he told his blacks. "Nochop that other fella," he said, with a shake of head.
In the end, a wedge-shaped segment of jungle was cleared. Near to thebeach remained one long palm. At the apex of the wedge stood another.Darkness was falling as the lanterns were lighted, carried up the twotrees, and made fast.
"That outer lantern is too high." David Grief studied it critically."Put it down about ten feet, Denby."
VI
The _Willi-Waw_ was tearing through the water with a bone in her teeth,for the breath of the passing squall was still strong. The blacks wereswinging up the big mainsail, which had been lowered on the run when thepuff was at its height. Jacobsen, superintending the operation, orderedthem to throw the halyards down on deck and stand by, then went for'ardon the lee-bow and joined Griffiths. Both men stared with wide-strainedeyes at the blank wall of darkness through which they were flying, theirears tense for the sound of surf on the invisible shore. It was by thissound that they were for the moment steering.
The wind fell lighter, the scud of clouds thinned and broke, and in thedim glimmer of starlight loomed the jungle-clad coast. Ahead, and wellon the lee-bow, appeared a jagged rock-point. Both men strained to it.
"Amboy Point," Griffiths announced. "Plenty of water close up. Take thewheel, Jacobsen, till we set a course. Get a move on!"
Running aft, barefooted and barelegged, the rainwater dripping from hisscant clothing, the mate displaced the black at the wheel.
"How's she heading?" Griffiths called.
"South-a-half-west!"
"Let her come up south-by-west! Got it?"
"Right on it!"
Griffiths considered the changed relation of Amboy Point to the_Willi-Waw_'s course.
"And a-half-west!" he cried.
"And a-half-west!" came the answer. "Right on it!"
"Steady
! That'll do!"
"Steady she is!" Jacobsen turned the wheel over to the savage. "Yousteer good fella, savve?" he warned. "No good fella, I knock your damnblack head off."
Again he went for'ard and joined the other, and again the cloud-scudthickened, the star-glimmer vanished, and the wind rose and screamed inanother squall.
"Watch that mainsail!" Griffiths yelled in the mate's ear, at the sametime studying the ketch's behaviour.
Over she pressed, and lee-rail under, while he measured the weight ofthe wind and quested its easement. The tepid sea-water, with here andthere tiny globules of phosphorescence, washed about his ankles andknees. The wind screamed a higher note, and every shroud and staysharply chorused an answer as the _Willi-Waw_ pressed farther over anddown.
"Down mainsail!" Griffiths yelled, springing to the peak-halyards,thrusting away the black who held on, and casting off the turn.
Jacobsen, at the throat-halyards, was performing the like office. Thebig sail rattled down, and the blacks, with shouts and yells, threwthemselves on the battling canvas. The mate, finding one skulking in thedarkness, flung his bunched knuckles into the creature's face and drovehim to his work.
The squall held at its high pitch, and under her small canvas the_Willi-Waw_ still foamed along. Again the two men stood for'ard andvainly watched in the horizontal drive of rain.
"We're all right," Griffiths said. "This rain won't last. We can holdthis course till we pick up the lights. Anchor in thirteen fathoms.You'd better overhaul forty-five on a night like this. After that getthe gaskets on the mainsail. We won't need it."