Chapter X: Murder and Shipwreck (2)

Together we managed to get the chest half-way up the companion, when another plunge made me slip, and the heavy box jammed the girl's feet against the side of the companion lining. I called loudly for help, as I could not extricate her from under the box. Fortunately, four native seamen heard me, and lifted the chest off her legs.

Then I heard the Captain's voice calling out, "Well done, boys! Rotumah men, brave fellows, in a boat!"

Carrying the girl below again, I dropped her in the steward's cabin, told her to stay there till I came back, and ran on deck.

The Captain met me, and, pointing to a dark, indistinct mass, rising and falling near the ship's stern, said, "There's real grit for you!"

It was one of the trader's whaleboats, manned by four Rotumah men and a native of Danger Island. Two of these brave fellows had been washed ashore in the second sea that had struck us, and with three others, who had reached the mangroves in another boat, had put out again to return to the brig and save their shipmates.

The Captain now called out to those who were left on board, and told them that there was a chance of some of them getting ashore, by jumping over as the boat approached and getting into her. As for himself, if three or four good men would stand by him, he would attempt to cut away the masts, and perhaps save the ship as the hawser was made fast to the _Europa_.

It was a new one, and might not part; but if it did, nothing could help the brig from sticking on the detached coral boulders that lay so close under the stern.

Seizing her child in her arms, a powerfully-built Ocean Island woman sprang into the seething foam-caldron, and disregarding our cries to make for the boat, struck out for the nearest point of the mangroves. Next morning the child was found unharmed on a small beach, more than a mile away, and the body of the mother lying dead beside her, with a fearful gash on her temple and one foot missing,--the poor babe gazing at the cold face, and wondering why she did not wake when she called to her. Then others followed the women, some getting into the boat, and others letting the sea take them in the direction of the shore.

"Where is the second mate?" shouted the Captain to the coxswain of the rescuing boat.

"On shore with the traders, sir; all the boats but one are stove in on the beach, and he can't get out again."

"All right, lads, don't attempt to come out again; but wait a minute." Then turning to me, "You must go ashore now in this boat. She has not many in her; and if her head is kept right into the break between the mountains she'll run up into the mangroves."

But I said I would take my chance with the ship. I was a good swimmer, and in that time of danger, even despair, I could not leave the Captain.

He pressed my hand silently, then called out, "All right, men, give way, the supercargo stays with me and the ship"; one dash of the oars, a wailing cry, a shout which out-toned it, and the boat disappeared, as if swallowed up by the darkness or the deep.

We were not clustered together aft. Those of the crew that had stood by the ship were hanging on to the main rigging. The Captain, who had hitherto intended cutting away both masts at once, told me he fancied the ship was straining and plunging less, and that he would only cut away as a last resource.

Suddenly he bent his glance at the hawser that was made fast to the _Europa_, and then pointed over to the seething water under our stern. I saw we were almost over a huge coral boulder, which every now and then showed itself bare.

"By ----! those fellows on board the _Europa_ are paying out the hawser. We were fifty feet from that rock when the hawser was made fast and had a strain on it, and now it's right under her stern. Can any of you see the whaler's cabin lights?"

The men looked through the blinding mists of spray that flew in our faces, and stung like whip-lashes when the brig was lifted high on a towering sea. The hawser tightened like an iron bar, but suddenly fell as if it had parted or been cast off.

"The cursed dogs!" said the Captain, opening and shutting his hands spasmodically, "they are paying out, and letting us go to the devil!"

And now a tremendous sea swept along and broke just as it reached abreast the mainmast. We felt the brig strike. Sea after sea tumbled in over the bulwarks, and a solid sheet of water broke over us in the main rigging, sweeping three or four men overboard.

When I cleared my throat of the water I had swallowed, I saw the Captain with a rifle in his hand, and then followed the flash as he fired in the direction of the _Europa_.

"Captain," I cried, "what good will that do? She may be ashore herself in as bad a fix as we are."

He pushed me aside as I placed my hand on his arm. "Stand clear, Hilary! I tell you these cowardly hounds are deliberately wrecking me. That ship is in a safe place, and could ride out a heavier gale than this."

"Captain," I began, when another sea lifted the brig's bow high in the air; then, with a dull crash, we struck stern on, and I saw the hawser had either parted or been cut away. The rudder had been torn from the stern-post, and ripped its way through the timbers with a fearful tearing sound. Again the Captain's face showed itself to me almost as white as the hell of boiling foam around us.

"My ship is dearer to me than my life!" he said, as he cast the rifle from him and stood gazing out into the howling storm, amid which all the voices of earth and air seemed to be contending.

Suddenly, with a pang of pity, I remembered that Lalia was in the steward's cabin. I dashed down below. Already the water was running into the hold, and as I gained the cabin the ship once more struck violently under my feet.

"Lalia! Lalia!" I called, "come with me. Can you walk?"

The girl was sitting up in the bunk, her hair unloosed, her eyes dilated with terror, as she gazed into the dimly-lighted cabin, and saw the water washing around it.

She could hardly stand with the pain in her bruised feet, but I lifted her out. Then she tore off her dress, stripped to the waist, and, hand in hand, we succeeded in gaining the companion-way just as a torrent of water filled the cabin and put out the lamps.

I felt the Captain's hand grasp me round the waist as we stumbled out on deck, and heard him say, "Hold on to me, Hilary! hold on like grim death, my girl!" as we were swept along by a sea against the bulwarks on the starboard side.

Some of the men had clung to a boat that we carried on top of the deck-house, which had been washed over the side. They had no oars, but the backwater from the reef dashed her up against the ship, and I have an indistinct remembrance of the Captain dragging us along with him, and attempting to lift the girl up, when a towering wave struck us right amidships and drove us all over together on top of the boat, which was already stove in.

I should have gone under then but for Lalia, for I had got a blow on the side from a piece of wreckage. Anyhow, what followed I cannot remember, for when I came to my senses it was daylight, and I was lying under some cocoa-nut trees with Lalia, and one of Harry Skilling's native retainers named Karta, bathing my back with fresh water.

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My first inquiry was for the Captain, and I was relieved to hear from Lalia that he was visible at that moment, directing the crew to save wreckage from the brig. The two whaleships had ridden out the gale in safety, and the _Europa_ was already under weigh. I thought it just as well it was so, for Hayston would, I am sure, have attempted to seize her.

Lalia told me that we clung to the boat till she struck a coral rock and went to pieces. Then every one was separated. She had been seized by Karta, and, still keeping hold of me, the three of us had come ashore together. She said also that my back was badly cut with the coral. The poor girl had a terrible gash on her arm, and this she had neglected to attend to me. I had a deep wound on my face, which caused me great pain, as a piece of tough coral had broken off in it.

Lalia was almost nude, and I had only the remnants of a pair of duck trousers. We did not feel cold, however, as the storm had ceased, and the sun was now shining brightly. The wind had gone down, and the harbour was nearly as smooth as a mountain lake. The only visible sign of the disaster of the night was the maintopmast of the _Leonora_, showing where she had gone down.

From the bank of mangroves on which we were located there was no access to the village of Utwé, where the rest of the ship's company were. Deep channels separated the two portions of the harbour. Karta was about to swim over to tell the Captain where I was, when Lalia caught him by the arm and pointed to the water. I have read a good many tall yarns about sharks, but never till now could I believe in their being as numerous as a shoal of minnows.

The channels were simply alive with the brutes dashing to and fro, lashing the water into foam, and contesting with each other for dark objects floating near the surface. I shuddered instinctively, but Lalia laughed, and explained that the dead bodies were those of pigs washed overboard from the brig.

Presently the tall figure of Karta attracted the notice of some of the people on the other side, and Lalia said the "ariki vaka" was coming over to us in one of the traders' whaleboats.

The Captain sprang out of the boat, and seeing me lying down with my head in the girl's lap thought I was dead.

"My dear boy," he said, taking both my hands and pressing them, "are you badly hurt?"

I showed him my back, and said I felt most pain in my side, and whereupon I suffered ten excruciating pains in one as he extracted the piece of flat coral from my face. He then called one of the boat's crew, and told him to take off his shirt, one sleeve of which he tore off and bound up Lalia's arm. He then gave her the mutilated garment to cover her bare body, saying in his old cheerful manner that her husband was all right, and was out searching the beaches for her. She made a gesture of indifference, and then fainted away. As soon as she revived she was lifted into the boat, and we pushed off for the village.

The Captain kept pressing my hand all the way over, and told me that since daylight he had been looking among the wreckage coming ashore and searching the beach for me, when some one saw our three figures in the cocoa-nut grove, and said two were white. Hayston knew this must be Lalia and myself, as she had a very fair skin. He was sincerely pleased at my escape, and no words need express my relief at his safety.

He took us forthwith to one of the villagers' houses, and told the people to attend to us, and see that we wanted for nothing. He further insisted that I should not attempt to render him any assistance until I was perfectly recovered. I could only nod acquiescence, as my side was paining me terribly.

A warm grasp of my hand and a kind look to Lalia and he was gone.

One of the Kusaie women in the house told us that a message had gone up to the king, and that a native doctor named Srulik would soon come down and cure my back with leaves in the island fashion. She also informed Lalia that her husband had gone away in a canoe to look for her body, with two natives, but that he had come across a case of gin, and was now dead drunk on the opposite side of Utwé. It is hardly to be expected that a young girl could feel love for a man of her husband's years; but tears of humiliation coursed down her cheeks when the woman added that he had already asked an Ocean Island girl to be wife to him.

About four o'clock in the afternoon messengers arrived from Lêlé with a message of regret from the king to Captain Hayston, and an invitation for me to Chabral harbour, so that I could get better quickly; and he could send his own boat for me. But I did not want to be separated from the Captain, and said I would come and visit him when I got permission.

Queen Sê sent me a large basket of cooked pigeons and fruit. Taking out a few for myself and Lalia, I sent the rest to the Captain, who was glad of them for his weary and hungry men.

For the next few days I suffered fearfully with the pain in my side, and though the Captain visited me twice a day, and tried all he could to cheer me up, I fell into a hopeless state of despondency. All the time Lalia had remained in the house, her husband, not having finished the case of gin, never coming near her. Her stepsons and daughters disliked her, and therefore avoided the house where we were staying.

The Captain told me that her arm was cut to the bone, and that the trade chest that had fallen against her had injured one foot badly. Never as long as I live shall I forget the unwearied attention and kindness which the poor girl showed me during our stay in the village. Though lame, and with only the use of one arm, she never left my side, and strove by every means in her power to allay the agony I endured--answering to my petulance and irritability only with smiles and kind words.

The Captain told me that he had saved a good many articles from the wreck; that the big trade chest had come ashore, and that the money and firearms were in a safe place. A quantity of liquor had also been saved, and already some fierce fights had taken place, but the traders had in most instances behaved well, and assisted him to maintain order. He told me also that Lalia's husband had taken away a lot of liquor into the impassable forest that lines the north side of Utwé, and, with two of his sons and several women, was having a big carouse.

"The virtuous and Christian Strong's islanders had," he said, "stolen about a thousand dollars' worth of trade that had been washed ashore. But," he added quietly, "I'll talk to them like a father as soon as I get a house built, and knock the devil out of those Pleasant islanders besides. They seem disposed to cut all our throats."

A couple of days after this, Hayston came to me with a letter from Lalia's husband, which he handed to me. I don't know whether amusement or indignation predominated as I read it, written as it was on a piece of account paper.

STRONG'S ISLAND, _March 11th_.

Supercargo _Leonora_ Brig.

DEAR FRIEND.--I heer my wife have took up with you, and say she
do'ent want anny mo-ar truck with her lawful husban. Captin
Hayston say No, but she must be cotton strong to you, not to
come to me when I look for her neerly one week amung two thousan
sharks, as I can prove, but I bare you no ill-wil, for I got
anuther wife, but you must give me the three rings she ware, and
I warn you I'm not responsble.--I remane, your true and sincere
friend.

_P.S._--Lal can read as well as me, and you can let her read
this. She is a good girl, and I bear no ill-wil.

The Captain laughed when I read out this precious document, and told me not to take matters so seriously. He then sat down and chatted for half-an-hour, saying that as soon as he had finished saving the wreckage, he had called the traders together, and laid certain proposals before them to which they had agreed.

These were that the traders and their followers would consider themselves under his direction, in which case he would engage to provide food for them during their stay on the island. They were not to have any commercial dealings with the people of Strong's Island, and their natives were to assist the crew of the _Leonora_ in erecting houses for their joint accommodation. After which he would endeavour to charter a vessel, probably a passing whaleship, to take the whole lot of us to Providence Island. Should no vessel call in six months' time, he would take a boat's crew and make for Millé Lagoon, six hundred miles distant. If the ketch I had brought down from Samoa was still afloat, he would bring her back, and take the people in detachments to Providence Island. He feared, however, that no more whalers would be calling in for ten months, as the _St. George_ and _Europa_ were the last of the fleet which was making, viâ Japan, for the Siberian coast, "right whaling."

He left us then, saying he had established a little republic on the narrow strip of land that lay on the sea-side of Utwé village.

Then I gave Lalia the letter I had received from her reprobate husband. She read it in silence and returned it to me, but I could see that the heartless old scoundrel's words had wounded her deeply. She took off some rings from her fingers, and sent them to the Captain to hand to the old man. "Do you think," she said, "that I can ever get back to Rapa-nui?" (Easter Island.)

Her father, she went on to say, was dead, and her mother had been among those unfortunate people who in 1866 were seized by three Peruvian slavers and taken to work the guano deposits on the Chincha Islands. She, when about fourteen, had married one of the captains of one of the ships owned by the great firm of Brander of Tahiti. The tales she told me of his brutality and ill-usage during his drunken fits of passion moved me to sincere pity. The unmitigated rascal deliberately sold his child wife to an American (or a man who called himself one), and by him she was taken to San Francisco and delivered into yet more hopeless slavery. Here she made the acquaintance of a Tahitian half-caste. She and this girl succeeded in escaping and paying their passages to Tahiti, where they landed penniless and starving.

* * * * *

From Tahiti she was taken by her present husband.