Chapter XIV: Clipping a Blackbird

Before we proceed to other matters, let us get rid of the _Blackbirder_.

She lay like a black blot on the smooth swell of the lagoon, and till we are quit of her the place will not feel clean. Civilisation, as represented by the dismantled brig, was as foul a thing as any the Dark Islands could show--not excepting even the terrors of the feasting-places. For what the dark men did they did in their darkness, and what the yellow men did they did in their light, and condemnation goes with knowledge.

And as it was here, so it was elsewhere. Vicious civilisation gashed Nature with a broad red wound and trampled her to earth. Fortunately, in this case there was healing and reparation. But it was not always so.

Blair and Cathie had had ample time during the return voyage to arrange their plans, Blair's part in the discussions consisting chiefly of acting as brake to the captain's whirring wheels. For Captain Cathie, honest man, foresaw such certain trouble from letting the raiders go that he would have strained many points to put it out of their power ever to return.

But Blair would have none of it.

"I haven't a doubt that you are right, captain," he said, "but even these men have got to have their chance. If they do come back, they must take the consequences. We will deal with them then as may seem best."

So while Blair and Evans followed Ha'o towards the village, Captain Cathie was busy in his own way. With his long brown gun menacing the brig, he sent his other two boats over in charge of his mate and Stuart, with instructions to deport the yellow men to a tiny crown of rock where the wall of the reef had crept up a few feet higher than elsewhere. It was a precarious lodging at best and uncomfortably damp, for the great ocean rollers broke on the seaward side in ceaseless thunder, and their spray lashed up to heaven, and came crashing over into the lagoon, and the rock was always wet. Captain Cathie jocularly expressed the opinion that the yellow men would be none the worse for a bit washing, for not one of them looked as if he had known soap since he was a kiddie.

He sent by Stuart, on his own responsibility, the information that he was going to disinfect their ship, and that if they were not all out of it in ten minutes he would sink it with a shot between wind and water. The yellow men turned green with apprehension, grabbed their meagre belongings under the certain belief that they were leaving their ship for good and all, and did as they were bidden. Then, leaving the captain of the _Blackbirder_ in strict custody, Cathie pulled over to the brig and proceeded to overhaul it with all the enjoyment of a humanitarian highwayman going through his victim's pockets.

Every bond and shackle they found was promptly tossed overboard. Every ounce of trade they could find--cloth, beads, knives, and so on, which might still be used for the enticement of unwary natives and the replenishment of a depleted exchequer--was annexed as salve for native wounds. Several rifles and revolvers, which the haste of the previous surrender, or malice prepense, had overlooked, were now included. Every keg of rum they could lay hands on was stove in and emptied into the lagoon, and when the captain was fairly satisfied that he had clipped the _Blackbirder's_ wings, for this voyage at any rate, and, as he jocularly said, had given the yellow men a chance of practising teetotal principles for a spell, though he feared the effect would only be temporary, he returned to the _Torch_ and sent his boats to bring back the prisoners from their damp roosting-place.

He explained to the gloomy-faced captain of the _Blackbirder_ what he had done, and why, and sent him back to his ship with instructions to refit as quickly as possible, to take in what water he needed, and to get away without delay, lest the natives should take it into their heads to pay him in their own way for his maltreatment of them.

"And tell him, sir," he said to Stuart, "that if I'd had my way I'd have strung every man of them up to the yardarm, and if they ever come back that's what they may expect, and I'll be delighted to have a hand in it."

When Blair and the rest came on board, they reported the village still in ruins. No attempt had been made to rebuild it yet, and they had seen no other natives than those who had come ashore from the brig.

The atoll men and women had camped in a bunch among the ruined houses, by starting a fire with a borrowed match and proceeding to cook some taro from the adjoining fields. The Dark Island men had scattered among the hills to find their friends and relatives, and to tell them of their wonderful deliverance.

Under the compulsion of the grinning long gun the Blackbirders worked hard at their rigging, and the party on the _Torch_ sat and watched them till the shadows chased the red glow of the sunset rapidly up the hills, and work was over for the day.

"It is very wonderful," was Blair's summing-up of the whole matter: "good once more comes out of evil. If the arranging of matters had been in our own hands, they could not have fallen more fortunately for us. In the ordinary course of things we might have been years in arriving at the position this catastrophe and its remedying have put us into. Ha'o and Nai will, I think, prove staunch friends. They know we desire nothing but their good. Through them we shall get all the rest by degrees."

"All I wish is that we'd hung those yellow blackguards, sir," said Cathie, with lingering regret. "It would only have been right common sense, after all."

"Hear, hear!" said Aunt Jannet Harvey.

"Well, well," said Blair. "It's generally easier to undo than to do. But our aim is life, not death. We shall have all we can do to put new life into our brown friends, without spending our energies and bruising our consciences by choking the old life out of our yellow enemies."

"All the same, sir, we'd have been safer for the future if those rascals were rolling at the bottom of the sea than floating quietly on top of it. If they don't come back here, they'll go somewhere else and play the same game."

"I'm afraid they will, captain; but all the same I don't see my way to hanging them. If they come back here, as they quite possibly may----"

"Will, sure," said the captain.

"Well, if they do it will be our duty to protect the sheep from the wolves."

"I'm half hoping they'll try it on," said Cathie. "Yon long gun would make fine play with 'em."

In the morning Blair and the other men went ashore again. The ladies begged to go too, but he thought it wiser to wait till they learned the minds of the rest of the islanders.

They found the atoll men busily at work running up shelters, and quite content with their new surroundings. This was a place of infinitely wider scope than their own circumscribed island, and they had no desire whatever to go back to it. Knowing how intense the racial hatreds were among the islands, Blair could only hope that Ha'o's influence might suffice for their protection.

He was wondering when any of the original inhabitants would turn up again, when he saw a straggling company descending the hill, and at the head of it Ha'o, easily recognisable by his costume of white towels.

He waved his hand at sight of them, and quickened his pace. As he drew near they saw that his face was very grim, and he began to speak so rapidly and energetically that Matti could only wait and absorb the sense of it without any attempt at translation.

"There is trouble," said Matti, turning to Blair as the other paused for breath. "In his absence, and thinking he was gone for good, his brother has become chief, and he will not give up his place."

"And what do the people say?" asked Blair, and Matti put the question.

"They are divided. There were some who were never contented, and there are some who always want change, and there are some who stand on one side to see which party is strongest. Those who were with me on the ship stay with me, and there are many others, but Ra'a"--Racha or Raka, his brother--"has also many. It will lead to trouble."

This was a quite unexpected development and obstacle. From his slight knowledge of island ways, Blair foresaw that it was a matter that might lead to constant strife. For there is no quarrel so bitter as a family quarrel, and the tribe is but the family on a larger scale.

"Come to the ship, Ha'o," he said, "and let us talk it over. Where is Nai?"

"She is with her people. She will come when I send for her. My other wives my brother has taken, but I do not want them."

"Is he likely to do anything unpleasant at once?"

"No; at present everything is----." And with his hands he indicated chaos.

The situation was a grave one in some respects, though still far better than it would have been had they landed entire strangers with all their footing to win.

It might even contain advantages, for Ha'o and his party would be driven by stress of circumstances still closer to them, and there was material enough to occupy them there for a long time to come.

Captain Cathie was for grasping this nettle again in such a way as to neutralise its sting.

"If we tackle them at once, Mr. Blair, we can knock the brother out and make things safe, and it'll maybe be the shortest cut in the end, and cost fewest lives. You know what these brown fellows are when they get to loggerheads among themselves. It's just Stewarts and Campbells over again, and no peace till one side or the other goes under."

Blair nodded.

"I know, captain; but, all the same, we can't begin by killing the men we want to convert. Gentle handling and patience may bring us to the appointed end. It may take longer, but the end, I think, will be the larger."

But Captain Cathie shook his head, and Aunt Jannet Harvey shook hers in unison.

"Some things are best nipped in the bud," said she, "and it seems to me that Mr. Ha'o has been very badly treated all round."

"Well, we've done our best for him, and we'll go on doing it, but we must do it in the way we think wisest."

Ha'o himself now struck in through Matti, and his question was the very natural one as to whether the white men, who had done so much for him, would continue to do so, and help him to recover his rights.

It took time and patience to explain to him that they would do everything they could without fighting, unless the other side attacked him, in which case they would help him and his people to defend themselves. Ha'o saw no use for the other side except to be killed--and possibly eaten. It was not possible as yet to make clear to him their object in coming to the islands. The root idea was beyond him. He had hoped with their help to smash the opposition out of hand, and was inclined to resent this, as it seemed to him, very lukewarm offer of defensive assistance. Blair, however, was at pains to explain, as far as was possible, that they had come not to fight--at which the brown man's eyes rested appreciatively on the long brown gun--but to teach him and his people better things than fighting, and that they would help him in every possible way--except, as Ha'o's face plainly showed, in this one way, for which he would willingly have foregone all the rest.

Blair showed him the tribute exacted from the _Blackbirder_, and told him the things were for himself and those who had been carried off with him, and the black eyes sparkled greedily.

Then Blair suggested that the first thing to do was to rebuild the village, and asked him to allot them land where they could build their own houses. At which Ha'o waved his hand regally over Kapaa'a and said, "Choose!"

They chose a spot at the head of the white sand spear, with the brush curving round behind, and the little river gurgling alongside. A dozen tall palms swung their crests above, in front lay the placid stretch of the lagoon, and beyond it the reef, and the white jets of foam, and the never-ending thunder of the breaking rollers.

By way of setting a good example to the islanders, and no less to impress upon the Blackbirders that they had come to stop, Captain Cathie got out and sent ashore the frames of the houses they had brought with them. One of the little steam-launches was got into working order, and before nightfall was chuffing merrily back and forth with load after load of necessaries, planks and beams and fittings; and what with the work on board the _Blackbirder_, and the traffic between the _Torch_ and the shore, and the doings on the beach, the lagoon of Kapaa'a was livelier than ever it had been since time began. Deadlier it had often been, but this was the beginning of the new life, and the dawn came to the Dark Islands in such commonplace guise as doors and windows, and chairs and tables and bedsteads.

By Cathie's advice they built their houses on piles, with roomy platforms under which the fresh sea breezes could blow at will.

Every man who could be spared from the ship helped in the building, and the work went on apace. Blair and Evans and Stuart, stripped to shirts and trousers, carried and sawed and hammered with the rest, and spared themselves not at all. The ladies would have come too, but reluctantly obeyed orders, and stopped on board till the political horizon should become somewhat more determined.

Ha'o and his people, after watching the small beginnings of a work that was far beyond their understanding, turned to their own business. Blair had a quantity of spades and axes brought ashore, and gave them to Ha'o for his building operations, and the effect on their spirits, as their hands closed on the handles, was magical. They rushed to the woods to try them, and when the white men went along presently to see how they were going on, they found the village already getting into shape.

There had evidently been some argument with the atoll men, who had thought to establish themselves on the old site, but they had now drawn off, and were stolidly building shelters a short distance away, and regarding with envious eyes the new tools of the island men.

That was soon put right, and a supply of axes for themselves transformed them into an excited, chattering crew, without a grievance in the world. Food was plentiful, the taro swamp was there to their hand, coco-nuts abounded, they had fire and water: what more could any man want, unless it was a slice of brother man to add zest to the feast? And at present both they and brother man were much too busy to give the matter the necessary consideration.

It took the _Blackbirder_ three days' hard work to clear away her damaged spars and refit sufficiently for the voyage. Her sulky master suggested a trip ashore to procure some new topmasts. Captain Cathie urged him to go, but expressed doubts as to the probability of his return; and on the morning of the fourth day, the launch having filled their water barrels for them, the _Torch_ got up steam and towed her enemy through the opening in the reef and out to a fair offing, and then cast her off and lay watching till she was hull-down on the eastward horizon. And the very last thing the scowling crew saw--for that time, at all events--was the menacing black mouth of the long gun, and Captain Cathie standing patting its big brown breech affectionately, but in a most unpleasantly meaning way.

"Well, thank God we're rid of them at last!" said

Aunt Jannet Harvey with fervour, as the brig caught the breeze and drew slowly away.

"We shall see them again, ma'am," said Captain Cathie.

"I wish we'd scuttled them," said Aunt Jannet.