you’ve got it permanently, I’m afraid.”
VI
On a sultry tropic day, when the last flicker of the far southeast trade was
fading out and the seasonal change for the northwest monsoon was
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33
coming on, the Kittiwake lifted above the sea-rim the jungle-clad coast of
Francis Island. Grief, with compass bearings and binoculars, identified the
volcano that marked Redscar, ran past Owen Bay, and lost the last of the
breeze at the entrance to Likikili Bay. With the two whaleboats out and
towing, and with Carlsen heaving the lead, the Kittiwake sluggishly
entered a deep and narrow indentation. There were no beaches. The
mangroves began at the water’s edge, and behind them rose steep jungle,
broken here and there by jagged peaks of rock. At the end of a mile, when
the white scar on the bluff bore west-southwest, the lead vindicated the
“Directory,” and the anchor rumbled down in nine fathoms.
For the rest of that day and until the afternoon of the day following they
remained on the Kittiwake and waited. No canoes appeared. There were no
signs of human life. Save for the occasional splash of a fish or the
screaming of cockatoos, there seemed no other life. Once, however, a
huge butterfly, twelve inches from tip to tip, fluttered high over their
mastheads and drifted across to the opposing jungle.
“There’s no use in sending a boat in to be cut up,” Grief said.
Pankburn was incredulous, and volunteered to go in alone, to swim it if he
couldn’t borrow the dingey.
“They haven’t forgotten the German cruiser,” Grief explained. “And I’ll
wager that bush is alive with men right now. What do you think, Mr.
Carlsen?”
That veteran adventurer of the islands was emphatic in his agreement.
In the late afternoon of the second day Grief ordered a whaleboat into the
water. He took his place in the bow, a live cigarette in his mouth and a
short-fused stick of dynamite in his hand, for he was bent on shooting a
mess of fish. Along the thwarts half a dozen Winchesters were placed.
Albright, who took the steering-sweep, had a Mauser within reach of hand.
They pulled in and along the green wall of vegetation. At times they rested
on the oars in the midst of a profound silence.
“Two to one the bush is swarming with them—in quids,” Albright
whispered. .
Pankburn listened a moment longer and took the bet. Five minutes later
they sighted a school of mullet. The brown rowers held their oars. Grief
touched the short fuse to his cigarette and threw the stick. So short was the
fuse that the stick exploded in the instant after it struck the water. And in
that same instant the bush exploded into life. There were wild yells of
A SON OF THE SUN
34
defiance, and black and naked bodies leaped forward like apes through the
mangroves.
In the whaleboat every rifle was lifted. Then came the wait. A hundred
blacks, some few armed with ancient Sniders, but the greater portion
armed with tomahawks, fire-hardened spears, and bone-tipped arrows,
clustered on the roots that rose out of the bay. No word was spoken. Each
party watched the other across twenty feet of water. An old, one-eyed
black, with a bristly face, rested a Snider on his hip, the muzzle directed at
Albright, who, in turn, covered him back with the Mauser. A couple of
minutes of this tableau endured. The stricken fish rose to the surface or
struggled half-stunned in the clear depths.
“It’s all right, boys,” Grief said quietly. “Put down your guns and over the
side with you. Mr. Albright, toss the tobacco to that one-eyed brute.”
While the Rapa men dived for the fish, Albright threw a bundle of trade
tobacco ashore. The one-eyed man nodded his head and writhed his
features in an attempt at amiability. Weapons were lowered, bows unbent,
and arrows put back in their quivers.
“They know tobacco,” Grief announced, as they rowed back aboard.
“We’ll have visitors. You’ll break out a case of tobacco, Mr. Albright, and
a few trade-knives. There’s a canoe now.”
Old One-Eye, as befitted a chief and leader, paddled out alone, facing peril
for the rest of the tribe. As Carlsen leaned over the rail to help the visitor
up, he turned his head and remarked casually:
“They’ve dug up the money, Mr. Grief. The old beggar’s loaded with it.”
One-Eye floundered down on deck, grinning appeasingly and failing to
hide the fear he had overcome but which still possessed him. He was lame
of one leg, and this was accounted for by a terrible scar, inches deep,
which ran down the thigh from hip to knee. No clothes he wore whatever,
not even a string, but his nose, perforated in a dozen places and each
perforation the setting for a carved spine of bone, bristled like a porcupine.
Around his neck and hanging down on his dirty chest was a string of gold
sovereigns. His ears were hung with silver half-crowns, and from the
cartilage separating his nostrils depended a big English penny, tarnished
and green, but unmistakable.
“Hold on, Grief,” Pankburn said, with perfectly assumed carelessness.
“You say they know only beads and tobacco. Very well. You follow my
lead. They’ve found the treasure, and we’ve got to trade them out of it. Get
the whole crew aside and lecture them that they are to be interested only in
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35
the pennies. Savve? Gold coins must be beneath contempt, and silver
coins merely tolerated. Pennies are to be the only desirable things.”
Pankburn took charge of the trading. For the penny in One-Eye’s nose he
gave ten sticks of tobacco. Since each stick cost David Grief a cent, the
bargain was manifestly unfair. But for the half-crowns Pankburn gave
only one stick each. The string of sovereigns he refused to consider. The
more he refused, the more One-Eye insisted on a trade. At last, with an
appearance of irritation and anger, and as a palpable concession, Pankburn
gave two sticks for the string, which was composed of ten sovereigns.
“I take my hat off to you,” Grief said to Pankburn that night at dinner.
“The situation is patent. You’ve reversed the scale of value. They’ll figure
the pennies as priceless possessions and the sovereigns as beneath price.
Result: they’ll hang on to the pennies and force us to trade for sovereigns.
Pankburn, I drink your health! Boy!—another cup of tea for Mr.
Pankburn.”
VII
Followed a golden week. From dawn till dark a row of canoes rested on
their paddles two hundred feet away. This was the dead-line. Rapa sailors,
armed with rifles, maintained it. But one canoe at a time was permitted
alongside, and but one black at a time was permitted to come over the rail.
Here, under the awning, relieving one another in hourly shifts, the four
white men carried on the trade. The rate of exchange was that established
by Pankburn with One-Eye. Five sovereigns fetched a stick of tobacco; a
hundred sovereigns, twenty sticks. Thus, a crafty-eyed cannibal would
deposit on the table a thousand dollars in gold, and go back over the rail,
hugely satisfied, with forty cents’ worth of tobacco in his hand.
“Hope we’ve got enough tobacco to hold out,” Carlsen muttered dubiously,
as another case was sawed in half.
Albright laughed.
“We’ve got fifty cases below,” he said, “and as I figure it, three cases buy a
hundred thousand dollars. There was only a million dollars buried, so
thirty cases ought to get it. Though, of course, we’ve got to allow a margin
for the silver and the pennies. That Ecuadoran bunch must have salted
down all the coin in sight.
Very few pennies and shillings appeared, though Pankburn continually
and anxiously inquired for them. Pennies were the one thing he seemed to
desire, and he made his eyes flash covetously whenever one was
produced. True to his theory, the savages concluded that the gold, being of
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36
slight value, must be disposed of first. A penny, worth fifty times as much
as a sovereign, was something to retain and treasure. Doubtless, in their
jungle-lairs, the wise old gray-beards put their heads together and agreed
to raise the price on pennies when the worthless gold was all worked off.
Who could tell? Mayhap the strange white men could be made to give
even twenty sticks for a priceless copper.
By the end of the week the trade went slack. There was only the slightest
dribble of gold. An occasional penny was reluctantly disposed of for ten
sticks, while several thousand dollars of silver came in.
On the morning of the eighth day no trading was done. The graybeards
had matured their plan and were demanding twenty sticks for a penny.
One-Eye delivered the new rate of exchange. The white men appeared to
take it with great seriousness, for they stood together debating in low