movement. The other two were his Kanaka cousins. All three were naked
and bloody. The arm of one Kanaka hung helpless and broken at his side.
The other man bled freely from a hideous scalp wound.
“Narii did that?” Mulhall demanded.
Grief shook his head. “No; it’s from being smashed along the deck and
over the house!”
Something suddenly ceased, leaving them in dizzying uncertainty. For the
moment it was hard to realize there was no wind. With the absolute
abruptness of a sword slash, the wind had been chopped off. The schooner
rolled and plunged, fetching up on her anchors with a crash which for the
first time they could hear. Also, for the first time they could hear the water
washing about on deck. The engineer threw off the propeller and eased the
engine down.
“We’re in the dead centre,” Grief said. “Now for the shift. It will come as
hard as ever” He looked at the barometer. “29:32,” he read.
Not in a moment could he tone down the voice which for hours had battled
against the wind, and so loudly did he speak that in the quiet it hurt the
others’ ears.
“All his ribs are smashed,” the supercargo said, feeling along Parlay’s side.
“He’s still breathing, but he’s a goner.”
Old Parlay groaned, moved one arm impotently, and opened his eyes. In
them was the light of recognition.
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148
“My brave gentlemen,” he whispered haltingly. “Don’t forget . . . the
auction . . . at ten o’clock . . . in hell.”
His eyes dropped shut and the lower jaw threatened to drop, but he
mastered the qualms of dissolution long enough to omit one final, loud,
derisive cackle.
Above and below pandemonium broke out. The old familiar roar of the
wind was with them. The Malahini, caught broadside, was pressed down
almost on her beam ends as she swung the arc compelled by her anchors.
They rounded her into the wind, where she jerked to an even keel. The
propeller was thrown on, and the engine took up its work again.
“Northwest!” Captain Warfield shouted to Grief when he came on deck.
“Hauled eight points like a shot!”
“Narii’ll never get across the lagoon now!” Grief observed.
“Then he’ll blow back to our side, worse luck!”
v
After the passing of the centre the barometer began to rise. Equally rapid
was the fall of the wind. When it was no more than a howling gale, the
engine lifted up in the air, parted its bed-plates with a last convulsive
effort of its forty horsepower, and lay down on its side. A wash of water
from the bilge sizzled over it and the steam arose in clouds. The engineer
wailed his dismay, but Grief glanced over the wreck affectionately and
went into the cabin to swab the grease off his chest and arms with bunches
of cotton waste.
The sun was up and the gentlest of summer breezes blowing when he
came on deck, after sewing up the scalp of one Kanaka and setting the
other’s arm. The Malahini lay close in to the beach. For’ard, Hermann and
the crew were heaving in and straightening out the tangle of anchors. The
Papara and the Tahaa were gone, and Captain Warfield, through the
glasses, was searching the opposite rim of the atoll.
“Not a stick left of them,” he said. “That’s what comes of not having
engines. They must have dragged across before the big shift came.”
Ashore, where Parlay’s house had been, was no vestige of any house. For
the space of three hundred yards, where the sea had breached, no tree or
even stump was left. Here and there, farther along, stood an occasional
palm, and there were numbers which had been snapped off above the
ground. In the crown of one surviving palm Tai-Hotauri asserted he saw
A SON OF THE SUN
149
something move. There were no boats left to the Malahini, and they
watched him swim ashore and climb the tree.
When he came back, they helped over the rail a young native girl of
Parley’s household. But first she passed up to them a battered basket. In it
was a litter of blind kittens—all dead save one, that feebly mewed and
staggered on awkward legs.
“Hello!” said Mulhall. “Who’s that?”
Along the beach they saw a man walking. He moved casually, as if out for
a morning stroll. Captain Warfield gritted his teeth. It was Narii Herring.
“Hello, skipper!” Narii called, when he was abreast of them. “Can I come
aboard and get some breakfast?”
Captain Warfield’s face and neck began to swell and turn purple. He tried
to speak, but choked.
“For two cents—for two cents—” was all he could manage to articulate.