had learned that; and he was resolved to keep his temper. And
before the day was out she capitulated. She was to go to Sydney on
the first steamer, purchase the schooner, and sail back with an
island skipper on board. And then she inveigled Sheldon into
agreeing that she could take occasional cruises in the islands,
though he was adamant when it came to a recruiting trip on Malaita.
That was the one thing barred.
And after it was all over, and a terse and business-like agreement
(by her urging) drawn up and signed, Sheldon paced up and down for
a full hour, meditating upon how many different kinds of a fool he
had made of himself. It was an impossible situation, and yet no
more impossible than the previous one, and no more impossible than
the one that would have obtained had she gone off on her own and
bought Pari-Sulay. He had never seen a more independent woman who
stood more in need of a protector than this boy-minded girl who had
landed on his beach with eight picturesque savages, a long-
barrelled revolver, a bag of gold, and a gaudy merchandise of
imagined romance and adventure.
He had never read of anything to compare with it. The fictionists,
as usual, were exceeded by fact. The whole thing was too
preposterous to be true. He gnawed his moustache and smoked
cigarette after cigarette. Satan, back from a prowl around the
compound, ran up to him and touched his hand with a cold, damp
nose. Sheldon caressed the animal’s ears, then threw himself into
a chair and laughed heartily. What would the Commissioner of the
Solomons think? What would his people at home think? And in the
one breath he was glad that the partnership had been effected and
sorry that Joan Lackland had ever come to the Solomons. Then he
went inside and looked at himself in a hand-mirror. He studied the
reflection long and thoughtfully and wonderingly.
CHAPTER XIV–THE MARTHA
They were deep in a game of billiards the next morning, after the
eleven o’clock breakfast, when Viaburi entered and announced, –
“Big fella schooner close up.”
Even as he spoke, they heard the rumble of chain through hawse-
pipe, and from the veranda saw a big black-painted schooner,
swinging to her just-caught anchor.
“It’s a Yankee,” Joan cried. “See that bow! Look at that
elliptical stern! Ah, I thought so–” as the Stars and Stripes
fluttered to the mast-head.
Noa Noah, at Sheldon’s direction, ran the Union Jack up the flag-
staff.
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70
“Now what is an American vessel doing down here?” Joan asked.
“It’s not a yacht, though I’ll wager she can sail. Look! Her
name! What is it?”
“Martha, San Francisco,” Sheldon read, looking through the
telescope. “It’s the first Yankee I ever heard of in the Solomons.
They are coming ashore, whoever they are. And, by Jove, look at
those men at the oars. It’s an all-white crew. Now what reason
brings them here?”
“They’re not proper sailors,” Joan commented. “I’d be ashamed of a
crew of black-boys that pulled in such fashion. Look at that
fellow in the bow–the one just jumping out; he’d be more at home
on a cow-pony.”
The boat’s-crew scattered up and down the beach, ranging about with
eager curiosity, while the two men who had sat in the stern-sheets
opened the gate and came up the path to the bungalow. One of them,
a tall and slender man, was clad in white ducks that fitted him
like a semi-military uniform. The other man, in nondescript
garments that were both of the sea and shore, and that must have
been uncomfortably hot, slouched and shambled like an overgrown
ape. To complete the illusion, his face seemed to sprout in all
directions with a dense, bushy mass of red whiskers, while his eyes
were small and sharp and restless.
Sheldon, who had gone to the head of the steps, introduced them to
Joan. The bewhiskered individual, who looked like a Scotsman, had
the Teutonic name of Von Blix, and spoke with a strong American
accent. The tall man in the well-fitting ducks, who gave the
English name of Tudor–John Tudor–talked purely-enunciated English
such as any cultured American would talk, save for the fact that it
was most delicately and subtly touched by a faint German accent.
Joan decided that she had been helped to identify the accent by the
short German-looking moustache that did not conceal the mouth and
its full red lips, which would have formed a Cupid’s bow but for
some harshness or severity of spirit that had moulded them
masculinely.
Von Blix was rough and boorish, but Tudor was gracefully easy in
everything he did, or looked, or said. His blue eyes sparkled and
flashed, his clean-cut mobile features were an index to his
slightest shades of feeling and expression. He bubbled with
enthusiasms, and his faintest smile or lightest laugh seemed
spontaneous and genuine. But it was only occasionally at first
that he spoke, for Von Blix told their story and stated their
errand.
They were on a gold-hunting expedition. He was the leader, and
Tudor was his lieutenant. All hands–and there were twenty-eight–
were shareholders, in varying proportions, in the adventure.
Several were sailors, but the large majority were miners, culled
from all the camps from Mexico to the Arctic Ocean. It was the old
and ever-untiring pursuit of gold, and they had come to the
Solomons to get it. Part of them, under the leadership of Tudor,
were to go up the Balesuna and penetrate the mountainous heart of
Guadalcanar, while the Martha, under Von Blix, sailed away for
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71
Malaita to put through similar exploration.
“And so,” said Von Blix, “for Mr. Tudor’s expedition we must have
some black-boys. Can we get them from you?”
“Of course we will pay,” Tudor broke in. “You have only to charge
what you consider them worth. You pay them six pounds a year,
don’t you?”
“In the first place we can’t spare them,” Sheldon answered. “We
are short of them on the plantation as it is.”
“WE?” Tudor asked quickly. “Then you are a firm or a partnership?
I understood at Guvutu that you were alone, that you had lost your
partner.”
Sheldon inclined his head toward Joan, and as he spoke she felt
that he had become a trifle stiff.
“Miss Lackland has become interested in the plantation since then.
But to return to the boys. We can’t spare them, and besides, they
would be of little use. You couldn’t get them to accompany you
beyond Binu, which is a short day’s work with the boats from here.
They are Malaita-men, and they are afraid of being eaten. They
would desert you at the first opportunity. You could get the Binu
men to accompany you another day’s journey, through the grass-
lands, but at the first roll of the foothills look for them to turn
back. They likewise are disinclined to being eaten.”
“Is it as bad as that?” asked Von Blix.
“The interior of Guadalcanar has never been explored,” Sheldon
explained. “The bushmen are as wild men as are to be found
anywhere in the world to-day. I have never seen one. I have never
seen a man who has seen one. They never come down to the coast,
though their scouting parties occasionally eat a coast native who
has wandered too far inland. Nobody knows anything about them.
They don’t even use tobacco–have never learned its use. The
Austrian expedition–scientists, you know–got part way in before
it was cut to pieces. The monument is up the beach there several
miles. Only one man got back to the coast to tell the tale. And
now you have all I or any other man knows of the inside of
Guadalcanar.”
“But gold–have you heard of gold?” Tudor asked impatiently. “Do
you know anything about gold?”
Sheldon smiled, while the two visitors hung eagerly upon his words.
“You can go two miles up the Balesuna and wash colours from the
gravel. I’ve done it often. There is gold undoubtedly back in the
mountains.”
Tudor and Von Blix looked triumphantly at each other.
“Old Wheatsheaf’s yarn was true, then,” Tudor said, and Von Blix
nodded. “And if Malaita turns out as well–”
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72
Tudor broke off and looked at Joan.
“It was the tale of this old beachcomber that brought us here,” he
explained. “Von Blix befriended him and was told the secret.” He
turned and addressed Sheldon. “I think we shall prove that white
men have been through the heart of Guadalcanar long before the time
of the Austrian expedition.”
Sheldon shrugged his shoulders.
“We have never heard of it down here,” he said simply. Then he
addressed Von Blix. “As to the boys, you couldn’t use them farther
than Binu, and I’ll lend you as many as you want as far as that.
How many of your party are going, and how soon will you start?”