faces of two women and a girl nodded concurrence in what he wanted. Their
heads were bent forward, they were animated by a suppressed eagerness, their
eyes flashed avariciously.
“I want a house,” Mapuhi went on. “It must have a roof of galvanized iron and
an octagon-drop-clock. It must be six fathoms long with a porch all around. A
big room must be in the centre, with a round table in the middle of it and the
octagon-drop-clock on the wall. There must be four bedrooms, two on each side
of the big room, and in each bedroom must be an iron bed, two chairs, and a
washstand. And back of the house must be a kitchen, a good kitchen, with pots
and pans and a stove. And you must build the house on my island, which is
Fakarava.”
“Is that all?” Raoul asked incredulously.
“There must be a sewing machine,” spoke up Tefara, Mapuhi’s wife.
“Not forgetting the octagon-drop-clock,” added Nauri, Mapuhi’s mother.
“Yes, that is all,” said Mapuhi.
Young Raoul laughed. He laughed long and heartily. But while he laughed he
secretly performed problems in mental arithmetic. He had never built a house
in his life, and his notions concerning house building were hazy. While he
laughed, he calculated the cost of the voyage to Tahiti for materials, of the
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106
materials themselves, of the voyage back again to Fakarava, and the cost of
landing the materials and of building the house. It would come to four
thousand French dollars, allowing a margin for safety–four thousand French
dollars were equivalent to twenty thousad francs. It was impossible. How was
he to know the value of such a pearl? Twenty thousand francs was a lot of
money–and of his mother’s money at that.
“Mapuhi,” he said, “you are a big fool. Set a money price.”
But Mapuhi shook his head, and the three heads behind him shook with his.
“I want the house,” he said. “It must be six fathoms long with a porch all
around–”
“Yes, yes,” Raoul interrupted. “I know all about your house, but it won’t do.
I’ll give you a thousand Chili dollars.”
The four heads chorused a silent negative.
“And a hundred Chili dollars in trade.”
“I want the house,” Mapuhi began.
“What good will the house do you?” Raoul demanded. “The first hurricane that
comes along will wash it away. You ought to know.
Captain Raffy says it looks like a hurricane right now.”
“Not on Fakarava,” said Mapuhi. “The land is much higher there. On this
island, yes. Any hurricane can sweep Hikueru. I will have the house on
Fakarava. It must be six fathoms long with a porch all around–”
And Raoul listened again to the tale of the house. Several hours he spent in
the endeavor to hammer the house obsession out of Mapuhi’s mind; but Mapuhi’s
mother and wife, and Ngakura, Mapuhi’s daughter, bolstered him in his resolve
for the house. Through the open doorway, while he listened for the twentieth
time to the detailed description of the house that was wanted, Raoul saw his
schooner’s second boat draw up on the beach. The sailors rested on the oars,
advertising haste to be gone. The first mate of the Aorai sprang ashore,
exchanged a word with the one-armed native, then hurried toward Raoul. The day
grew suddenly dark, as a squall obscured the face of the sun. Across the
lagoon Raoul could see approaching the ominous line of the puff of wind.
“Captain Raffy says you’ve got to get to hell outa here,” was the mate’s
greeting. “If there’s any shell, we’ve got to run the risk of picking it up
later on–so he says. The barometer’s dropped to twenty-nine-seventy.”
The gust of wind struck the pandanus tree overhead and tore through the palms
beyond, flinging half a dozen ripe cocoanuts with heavy thuds to the ground.
Then came the rain out of the distance, advancing with the roar of a gale of
wind and causing the water of the lagoon to smoke in driven windrows. The
sharp rattle of the first drops was on the leaves when Raoul sprang to his
feet.
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“A thousand Chili dollars, cash down, Mapuhi,” he said. “And two hundred Chili
dollars in trade.”
“I want a house–” the other began.
“Mapuhi!” Raoul yelled, in order to make himself heard. “You are a fool!”
He flung out of the house, and, side by side with the mate, fought his way
down the beach toward the boat. They could not see the boat. The tropic rain
sheeted about them so that they could see only the beach under their feet and
the spiteful little waves from the lagoon that snapped and bit at the sand. A
figure appeared through the deluge. It was Huru-Huru, the man with the one
arm.
“Did you get the pearl?” he yelled in Raoul’s ear.
“Mapuhi is a fool!” was the answering yell, and the next moment they were lost
to each other in the descending water.
Half an hour later, Huru-Huru, watching from the seaward side of the atoll,
saw the two boats hoisted in and the Aorai pointing her nose out to sea. And
near her, just come in from the sea on the wings of the squall, he saw another
schooner hove to and dropping a boat into the water. He knew her. It was the
OROHENA, owned by Toriki, the half-caste trader, who served as his own
supercargo and who doubtlessly was even then in the stern sheets of the boat.
Huru-Huru chuckled. He knew that Mapuhi owed Toriki for trade goods advanced
the year before.
The squall had passed. The hot sun was blazing down, and the lagoon was once
more a mirror. But the air was sticky like mucilage, and the weight of it
seemed to burden the lungs and make breathing difficult.
“Have you heard the news, Toriki?” Huru-Huru asked. “Mapuhi has found a pearl.
Never was there a pearl like it ever fished up in Hikueru, nor anywhere in the
Paumotus, nor anywhere in all the world. Mapuhi is a fool. Besides, he owes
you money. Remember that I told you first. Have you any tobacco?”
And to the grass shack of Mapuhi went Toriki. He was a masterful man, withal a
fairly stupid one. Carelessly he glanced at the wonderful pearl–glanced for a
moment only; and carelessly he dropped it into his pocket.
“You are lucky,” he said. “It is a nice pearl. I will give you credit on the
books.”
“I want a house,” Mapuhi began, in consternation. “It must be six fathoms–”
“Six fathoms your grandmother!” was the trader’s retort. “You want to pay up
your debts, that’s what you want. You owed me twelve hundred dollars Chili.
Very well; you owe them no longer. The amount is squared. Besides, I will give
you credit for two hundred Chili. If, when I get to Tahiti, the pearl sells
well, I will give you credit for another hundred–that will make three
hundred. But mind, only if the pearl sells well. I may even lose money on it.”
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Mapuhi folded his arms in sorrow and sat with bowed head. He had been robbed
of his pearl. In place of the house, he had paid a debt. There was nothing to
show for the pearl.
“You are a fool,” said Tefara.
“You are a fool,” said Nauri, his mother. “Why did you let the pearl into his
hand?”
“What was I to do?” Mapuhi protested. “I owed him the money. He knew I had the
pearl. You heard him yourself ask to see it. I had not told him. He knew.
Somebody else told him. And I owed him the money.”
“Mapuhi is a fool,” mimicked Ngakura.
She was twelve years old and did not know any better. Mapuhi relieved his
feelings by sending her reeling from a box on the ear; while Tefara and Nauri
burst into tears and continued to upbraid him after the manner of women.
Huru-Huru, watching on the beach, saw a third schooner that he knew heave to
outside the entrance and drop a boat. It was the Hira, well named, for she was
owned by Levy, the German Jew, the greatest pearl buyer of them all, and, as
was well known, Hira was the Tahitian god of fishermen and thieves.
“Have you heard the news?” Huru-Huru asked, as Levy, a fat man with massive
asymmetrical features, stepped out upon the beach. “Mapuhi has found a pearl.
There was never a pearl like it in Hikueru, in all the Paumotus, in all the
world. Mapuhi is a fool. He has sold it to Toriki for fourteen hundred
Chili–I listened outside and heard. Toriki is likewise a fool. You can buy it
from him cheap. Remember that I told you first. Have you any tobacco?”
“Where is Toriki?”
“In the house of Captain Lynch, drinking absinthe. He has been there an hour.”