The Princess
A FIRE burned cheerfully in the jungle camp, and beside the firelolled a cheerful-seeming though horrible-appearing man. This wasa hobo jungle, pitched in a thin strip of woods that lay between arailroad embankment and the bank of a river. But no hobo was theman. So deep-sunk was he in the social abyss that a proper hobowould not sit by the same fire with him. A gay-cat, who is anignorant new-comer on the "Road," might sit with such as he, butonly long enough to learn better. Even low down bindle-stiffs andstew-bums, after a once-over, would have passed this man by. Agenuine hobo, a couple of punks, or a bunch of tender-yeared road-kids might have gone through his rags for any stray pennies ornickels and kicked him out into the darkness. Even an alki-stiffwould have reckoned himself immeasurably superior.For this man was that hybrid of tramp-land, an alki-stiff that hasdegenerated into a stew-bum, with so little self-respect that hewill never "boil-up," and with so little pride that he will eat outof a garbage can. He was truly horrible-appearing. He might havebeen sixty years of age; he might have been ninety. His garmentsmight have been discarded by a rag-picker. Beside him, an unrolledbundle showed itself as consisting of a ragged overcoat andcontaining an empty and smoke-blackened tomato can, an empty andbattered condensed milk can, some dog-meat partly wrapped in brownpaper and evidently begged from some butcher-shop, a carrot thathad been run over in the street by a wagon-wheel, three greenish-cankered and decayed potatoes, and a sugar-bun with a mouthfulbitten from it and rescued from the gutter, as was made patent bythe gutter-filth that still encrusted it.A prodigious growth of whiskers, greyish-dirty and untrimmed foryears, sprouted from his face. This hirsute growth should havebeen white, but the season was summer and it had not been exposedto a rain-shower for some time. What was visible of the facelooked as if at some period it had stopped a hand-grenade. Thenose was so variously malformed in its healed brokenness that therewas no bridge, while one nostril, the size of a pea, openeddownward, and the other, the size of a robin's egg, tilted upwardto the sky. One eye, of normal size, dim-brown and misty, bulgedto the verge of popping out, and as if from senility wept copiouslyand continuously. The other eye, scarcely larger than a squirrel'sand as uncannily bright, twisted up obliquely into the hairy scarof a bone-crushed eyebrow. And he had but one arm.Yet was he cheerful. On his face, in mild degree, was depictedsensuous pleasure as he lethargically scratched his ribs with hisone hand. He pawed over his food-scraps, debated, then drew atwelve-ounce druggist bottle from his inside coat-pocket. Thebottle was full of a colourless liquid, the contemplation of whichmade his little eye burn brighter and quickened his movements.Picking up the tomato can, he arose, went down the short path tothe river, and returned with the can filled with not-nice riverwater. In the condensed milk can he mixed one part of water withtwo parts of fluid from the bottle. This colourless fluid wasdruggist's alcohol, and as such is known in tramp-land as "alki."Slow footsteps, coming down the side of the railroad embankment,alarmed him ere he could drink. Placing the can carefully upon theground between his legs, he covered it with his hat and waitedanxiously whatever impended.Out of the darkness emerged a man as filthy ragged as he. The new-comer, who might have been fifty, and might have been sixty, wasgrotesquely fat. He bulged everywhere. He was composed of bulges.His bulbous nose was the size and shape of a turnip. His eyelidsbulged and his blue eyes bulged in competition with them. In manyplaces the seams of his garments had parted across the bulges ofbody. His calves grew into his feet, for the broken elastic sidesof his Congress gaiters were swelled full with the fat of him. Onearm only he sported, from the shoulder of which was suspended asmall and tattered bundle with the mud caked dry on the outercovering from the last place he had pitched his doss. He advancedwith tentative caution, made sure of the harmlessness of the manbeside the fire, and joined him."Hello, grandpa," the new-comer greeted, then paused to stare atthe other's flaring, sky-open nostril. "Say, Whiskers, how'd yekeep the night dew out of that nose o' yourn?"Whiskers growled an incoherence deep in his throat and spat intothe fire in token that he was not pleased by the question."For the love of Mike," the fat man chuckled, "if you got caughtout in a rainstorm without an umbrella you'd sure drown, wouldn'tyou?""Can it, Fatty, can it," Whiskers muttered wearily. "They ain'tnothin' new in that line of chatter. Even the bulls hand it out tome.""But you can still drink, I hope"; Fatty at the same time mollifiedand invited, with his one hand deftly pulling the slip-knots thatfastened his bundle.From within the bundle he brought to light a twelve-ounce bottle ofalki. Footsteps coming down the embankment alarmed him, and he hidthe bottle under his hat on the ground between his legs.But the next comer proved to be not merely one of their own ilk,but likewise to have only one arm. So forbidding of aspect was hethat greetings consisted of no more than grunts. Huge-boned, tall,gaunt to cadaverousness, his face a dirty death's head, he was asrepellent a nightmare of old age as ever Dore imagined. Histoothless, thin-lipped mouth was a cruel and bitter slash under agreat curved nose that almost met the chin and that was like abuzzard's beak. His one hand, lean and crooked, was a talon. Thebeady grey eyes, unblinking and unwavering, were bitter as death,as bleak as absolute zero and as merciless. His presence was achill, and Whiskers and Fatty instinctively drew together forprotection against the unguessed threat of him. Watching hischance, privily, Whiskers snuggled a chunk of rock several poundsin weigh close to his hand if need for action should arise. Fattyduplicated the performance.Then both sat licking their lips, guiltily embarrassed, while theunblinking eyes of the terrible one bored into them, now into one,now into another, and then down at the rock-chunks of theirpreparedness."Huh!" sneered the terrible one, with such dreadfulness of menaceas to cause Whiskers and Fatty involuntarily to close their handsdown on their cave-man's weapons."Huh!" the other repeated, reaching his one talon into his sidecoat pocket with swift definiteness. "A hell of a chance you twocheap bums 'd have with me."The talon emerged, clutching ready for action a six-pound ironquoit."We ain't lookin' for trouble, Slim," Fatty quavered."Who in hell are you to call me 'Slim'?" came the snarling answer."Me? I'm just Fatty, an' seein' 's I never seen you before - ""An' I suppose that's Whiskers, there, with the gay an' festivelamp tan-going into his eyebrow an' the God-forgive-us nose joy-riding all over his mug?""It'll do, it'll do," Whiskers muttered uncomfortably. "Onemonica's as good as another, I find, at my time of life. Andeverybody hands it out to me anyway. And I need an umbrella whenit rains to keep from getting drowned, an' all the rest of it.""I ain't used to company - don't like it," Slim growled. "So ifyou guys want to stick around, mind your step, that's all, mindyour step."He fished from his pocket a cigar stump, self-evidently shot fromthe gutter, and prepared to put it in his mouth to chew. Then hechanged his mind, glared at his companions savagely, and unrolledhis bundle. Appeared in his hand a druggist's bottle of alki."Well," he snarled, "I suppose I gotta give you cheap skates adrink when I ain't got more'n enough for a good petrification formyself."Almost a softening flicker of light was imminent in his witheredface as he beheld the others proudly lift their hats and exhibittheir own supplies."Here's some water for the mixin's," Whiskers said, proffering histomato-can of river slush. "Stockyards just above," he addedapologetically. "But they say - ""Huh!" Slim snapped short, mixing the drink. "I've drunk worse'nstockyards in my time."Yet when all was ready, cans of alki in their solitary hands, thethree things that had once been men hesitated, as if of old habit,and next betrayed shame as if at self-exposure.Whiskers was the first to brazen it."I've sat in at many a finer drinking," he bragged."With the pewter," Slim sneered."With the silver," Whiskers corrected.Slim turned a scorching eye-interrogation on Fatty.Fatty nodded."Beneath the salt," said Slim."Above it," came Fatty's correction. "I was born above it, andI've never travelled second class. First or steerage, but nointermediate in mine.""Yourself?" Whiskers queried of Slim."In broken glass to the Queen, God bless her," Slim answered,solemnly, without snarl or sneer."In the pantry?" Fatty insinuated.Simultaneously Slim reached for his quoit, and Whiskers and Fattyfor their rocks."Now don't let's get feverish," Fatty said, dropping his ownweapon. "We aren't scum. We're gentlemen. Let's drink likegentlemen.""Let it be a real drinking," Whiskers approved."Let's get petrified," Slim agreed. "Many a distillery's flowedunder the bridge since we were gentlemen; but let's forget the longroad we've travelled since, and hit our doss in the good oldfashion in which every gentleman went to bed when we were young.""My father done it - did it," Fatty concurred and corrected, as oldrecollections exploded long-sealed brain-cells of connotation andcorrect usage.The other two nodded a descent from similar fathers, and elevatedtheir tin cans of alcohol.By the time each had finished his own bottle and from his ragsfished forth a second one, their brains were well-mellowed and a-glow, although they had not got around to telling their real names.But their English had improved. They spoke it correctly, while theargo of tramp-land ceased from their lips."It's my constitution," Whiskers was explaining. "Very few mencould go through what I have and live to tell the tale. And Inever took any care of myself. If what the moralists and thephysiologists say were true, I'd have been dead long ago. And it'sthe same with you two. Look at us, at our advanced years,carousing as the young ones don't dare, sleeping out in the open onthe ground, never sheltered from frost nor rain nor storm, neverafraid of pneumonia or rheumatism that would put half the youngones on their backs in hospital."He broke off to mix another drink, and Fatty took up the tale."And we've had our fun," he boasted, "and speaking of sweetheartsand all," he cribbed from Kipling, "'We've rogued and we've ranged- '""'In our time,'" Slim completed the crib for him."I should say so, I should say so," Fatty confirmed. "And beenloved by princesses - at least I have.""Go on and tell us about it," Whiskers urged. "The night's young,and why shouldn't we remember back to the roofs of kings?"Nothing loth, Fatty cleared his throat for the recital and castabout in his mind for the best way to begin."It must be known that I came of good family. Percival Delaney,let us say, yes, let us say Percival Delaney, was not unknown atOxford once upon a time - not for scholarship, I am frank to admit;but the gay young dogs of that day, if any be yet alive, wouldremember him - ""My people came over with the Conqueror," Whiskers interrupted,extending his hand to Fatty's in acknowledgment of theintroduction."What name?" Fatty queried. "I did not seem quite to catch it.""Delarouse, Chauncey Delarouse. The name will serve as well asany."Both completed the handshake and glanced to Slim."Oh, well, while we're about it . . . " Fatty urged."Bruce Cadogan Cavendish," Slim growled morosely. "Go on,Percival, with your princesses and the roofs of kings.""Oh, I was a rare young devil," Percival obliged, "after I playedducks and drakes at home and sported out over the world. And I wassome figure of a man before I lost my shape - polo, steeple-chasing, boxing. I won medals at buckjumping in Australia, and Iheld more than several swimming records from the quarter of a mileup. Women turned their heads to look when I went by. The women!God bless them!"And Fatty, alias Percival Delaney, a grotesque of manhood, put hisbulgy hand to his puffed lips and kissed audibly into the starryvault of the sky."And the Princess!" he resumed, with another kiss to the stars."She was as fine a figure of a woman as I was a man, as high-spirited and courageous, as reckless and dare-devilish. Lord,Lord, in the water she was a mermaid, a sea-goddess. And when itcame to blood, beside her I was parvenu. Her royal line tracedback into the mists of antiquity."She was not a daughter of a fair-skinned folk. Tawny golden wasshe, with golden-brown eyes, and her hair that fell to her kneeswas blue-black and straight, with just the curly tendrilly tendencythat gives to woman's hair its charm. Oh, there were no kinks init, any more than were there kinks in the hair of her entiregenealogy. For she was Polynesian, glowing, golden, lovely andlovable, royal Polynesian."Again he paused to kiss his hand to the memory of her, and Slim,alias Bruce Cadogan Cavendish, took advantage to interject:"Huh! Maybe you didn't shine in scholarship, but at least yougleaned a vocabulary out of Oxford.""And in the South Seas garnered a better vocabulary from thelexicon of Love," Percival was quick on the uptake."It was the island of Talofa," he went on, "meaning love, the Isleof Love, and it was her island. Her father, the king, an old man,sat on his mats with paralysed knees and drank squareface gin allday and most of the night, out of grief, sheer grief. She, myprincess, was the only issue, her brother having been lost in theirdouble canoe in a hurricane while coming up from a voyage to Samoa.And among the Polynesians the royal women have equal right with themen to rule. In fact, they trace their genealogies always by thefemale line."To this both Chauncey Delarouse and Bruce Cadogan Cavendish noddedprompt affirmation."Ah," said Percival, "I perceive you both know the South Seas,wherefore, without undue expenditure of verbiage on my part, I amassured that you will appreciate the charm of my princess, thePrincess Tui-nui of Talofa, the Princess of the Isle of Love."He kissed his hand to her, sipped from his condensed milk can aman-size drink of druggist's alcohol, and to her again kissed herhand."But she was coy, and ever she fluttered near to me but never nearenough. When my arm went out to her to girdle her, presto, she wasnot there. I knew, as never before, nor since, the thousand dearand delightful anguishes of love frustrated but ever resilient andbeckoned on by the very goddess of love.""Some vocabulary," Bruce Cadogan Cavendish muttered in aside toChauncey Delarouse. But Percival Delaney was not to be deterred.He kissed his pudgy hand aloft into the night and held warmly on."No fond agonies of rapture deferred that were not lavished upon meby my dear Princess, herself ever a luring delight of promiseflitting just beyond my reach. Every sweet lover's infernounguessed of by Dante she led me through. Ah! Those swooningtropic nights, under our palm trees, the distant surf a langourousmurmur as from some vast sea shell of mystery, when she, myPrincess, all but melted to my yearning, and with her laughter,that was as silver strings by buds and blossoms smitten, all butmade lunacy of my lover's ardency."It was by my wrestling with the champions of Talofa that I firstinterested her. It was by my prowess at swimming that I awoke her.And it was by a certain swimming deed that I won from her more thancoquettish smiles and shy timidities of feigned retreat."We were squidding that day, out on the reef - you know how,undoubtedly, diving down the face of the wall of the reef, fivefathoms, ten fathoms, any depth within reason, and shoving oursquid-sticks into the likely holes and crannies of the coral wheresquid might be lairing. With the squid-stick, bluntly sharp atboth ends, perhaps a foot long, and held crosswise in the hand, thetrick was to gouge any lazying squid until he closed his tentaclesaround fist, stick and arm. - Then you had him, and came to thesurface with him, and hit him in the head which is in the centre ofhim, and peeled him off into the waiting canoe. . . . And to thinkI used to do that!"Percival Delaney paused a moment, a glimmer of awe on his rotundface, as he contemplated the mighty picture of his youth."Why, I've pulled out a squid with tentacles eight feet long, anddone it under fifty feet of water. I could stay down four minutes.I've gone down, with a coral-rock to sink me, in a hundred and tenfeet to clear a fouled anchor. And I could back-dive with a once-over and go in feet-first from eighty feet above the surface - ""Quit it, delete it, cease it," Chauncey Delarouse admonishedtestily. "Tell of the Princess. That's what makes old blood leapagain. Almost can I see her. Was she wonderful?"Percival Delaney kissed unutterable affirmation."I have said she was a mermaid. She was. I know she swam thirty-six hours before being rescued, after her schooner was capsized ina double-squall. I have seen her do ninety feet and bring up pearlshell in each hand. She was wonderful. As a woman she wasravishing, sublime. I have said she was a sea-goddess. She was.Oh, for a Phidias or a Praxiteles to have made the wonder of herbody immortal!"And that day, out for squid on the reef, I was almost sick forher. Mad - I know I was mad for her. We would step over the sidefrom the big canoe, and swim down, side by side, into the deliciousdepths of cool and colour, and she would look at me, as we swam,and with her eyes tantalize me to further madness. And at last,down, far down, I lost myself and reached for her. She eluded melike the mermaid she was, and I saw the laughter on her face as shefled. She fled deeper, and I knew I had her for I was between herand the surface; but in the muck coral sand of the bottom she madea churning with her squid stick. It was the old trick to escape ashark. And she worked it on me, rolling the water so that I couldnot see her. And when I came up, she was there ahead of me,clinging to the side of the canoe and laughing."Almost I would not be denied. But not for nothing was she aprincess. She rested her hand on my arm and compelled me tolisten. We should play a game, she said, enter into a competitionfor which should get the more squid, the biggest squid, and thesmallest squid. Since the wagers were kisses, you can well imagineI went down on the first next dive with soul aflame."I got no squid. Never again in all my life have I dived forsquid. Perhaps we were five fathoms down and exploring the face ofthe reefwall for lurking places of our prey, when it happened. Ihad found a likely lair and just proved it empty, when I felt orsensed the nearness of something inimical. I turned. There itwas, alongside of me, and no mere fish-shark. Fully a dozen feetin length, with the unmistakable phosphorescent cat's eye gleaminglike a drowning star, I knew it for what it was, a tiger shark."Not ten feet to the right, probing a coral fissure with her squidstick, was the Princess, and the tiger shark was heading directlyfor her. My totality of thought was precipitated to consciousnessin a single all-embracing flash. The man-eater must be deflectedfrom her, and what was I, except a mad lover who would gladly fightand die, or more gladly fight and live, for his beloved? Remember,she was the woman wonderful, and I was aflame for her."Knowing fully the peril of my act, I thrust the blunt-sharp end ofmy squid-stick into the side of the shark, much as one wouldattract a passing acquaintance with a thumb-nudge in the ribs. Andthe man-eater turned on me. You know the South Seas, and you knowthat the tiger shark, like the bald-face grizzly of Alaska, nevergives trail. The combat, fathoms deep under the sea, was on - ifby combat may be named such a one-sided struggle."The Princess unaware, caught her squid and rose to the surface.The man-eater rushed me. I fended him off with both hands on hisnose above his thousand-toothed open mouth, so that he backed meagainst the sharp coral. The scars are there to this day.Whenever I tried to rise, he rushed me, and I could not remain downthere indefinitely without air. Whenever he rushed me, I fendedhim off with my hands on his nose. And I would have escapedunharmed, except for the slip of my right hand. Into his mouth itwent to the elbow. His jaws closed, just below the elbow. Youknow how a shark's teeth are. Once in they cannot be released.They must go through to complete the bite, but they cannot gothrough heavy bone. So, from just below the elbow he stripped thebone clean to the articulation of the wrist-joint, where his teethmet and my good right hand became his for an appetizer."But while he was doing this, I drove the thumb of my left hand, tothe hilt into his eye-orifice and popped out his eye. This did notstop him. The meat had maddened him. He pursued the gushing stumpof my wrist. Half a dozen times I fended with my intact arm. Thenhe got the poor mangled arm again, closed down, and stripped themeat off the bone from the shoulder down to the elbow-joint, wherehis teeth met and he was free of his second mouthful of me. But,at the same time, with my good arm, I thumbed out his remainingeye."Percival Delaney shrugged his shoulders, ere he resumed."From above, those in the canoe had beheld the entire happening andwere loud in praise of my deed. To this day they still sing thesong of me, and tell the tale of me. And the Princess." His pausewas brief but significant. "The Princess married me. . . . Oh,well-a-day and lack-a-day, the whirligig of time and fortune, thetopsyturviness of luck, the wooden shoe going up and the polishedheel descending a French gunboat, a conquered island kingdom ofOceania, to-day ruled over by a peasant-born, unlettered, colonialgendarme, and . . . "He completed the sentence and the tale by burying his face in thedown-tilted mouth of the condensed milk can and by gurgling thecorrosive drink down his throat in thirsty gulps.After an appropriate pause, Chauncey Delarouse, otherwise Whiskers,took up the tale."Far be it from me to boast of no matter what place of birth I havedescended from to sit here by this fire with such as . . . aschance along. I may say, however, that I, too, was once aconsiderable figure of a man. I may add that it was horses, plusparents too indulgent, that exiled me out over the world. I maystill wonder to query: 'Are Dover's cliffs still white?'""Huh!" Bruce Cadogan Cavendish sneered. "Next you'll be asking:'How fares the old Lord Warden?'""And I took every liberty, and vainly, with a constitution that wasiron," Whiskers hurried on. "Here I am with my three score and tenbehind me, and back on that long road have I buried many ayoungster that was as rare and devilish as I, but who could notstand the pace. I knew the worst too young. And now I know theworst too old. But there was a time, alas all too short, when Iknew, the best."I, too, kiss my hand to the Princess of my heart. She was truly aprincess, Polynesian, a thousand miles and more away to theeastward and the south from Delaney's Isle of Love. The natives ofall around that part of the South Seas called it the Jolly Island.Their own name, the name of the people who dwelt thereon,translates delicately and justly into 'The Island of TranquilLaughter.' On the chart you will find the erroneous name given toit by the old navigators to be Manatomana. The seafaring gentrythe round ocean around called it the Adamless Eden. And themissionaries for a time called it God's Witness - so great had beentheir success at converting the inhabitants. As for me, it was,and ever shall be, Paradise."It was MY Paradise, for it was there my Princess lived. JohnAsibeli Tungi was king. He was full-blooded native, descended outof the oldest and highest chief-stock that traced back to Manuawhich was the primeval sea home of the race. Also was he known asJohn the Apostate. He lived a long life and apostasizedfrequently. First converted by the Catholics, he threw down theidols, broke the tabus, cleaned out the native priests, executed afew of the recalcitrant ones, and sent all his subjects to church."Next he fell for the traders, who developed in him a champagnethirst, and he shipped off the Catholic priests to New Zealand.The great majority of his subjects always followed his lead, and,having no religion at all, ensued the time of the GreatLicentiousness, when by all South Seas missionaries his island, insermons, was spoken of as Babylon."But the traders ruined his digestion with too much champagne, andafter several years he fell for the Gospel according to theMethodists, sent his people to church, and cleaned up the beach andthe trading crowd so spick and span that he would not permit themto smoke a pipe out of doors on Sunday, and, fined one of the chieftraders one hundred gold sovereigns for washing his schooner'sdecks on the Sabbath morn."That was the time of the Blue Laws, but perhaps it was toorigorous for King John. Off he packed the Methodists, one fineday, exiled several hundred of his people to Samoa for sticking toMethodism, and, of all things, invented a religion of his own, withhimself the figure-head of worship. In this he was aided andabetted by a renegade Fijian. This lasted five years. Maybe hegrew tired of being God, or maybe it was because the Fijiandecamped with the six thousand pounds in the royal treasury; but atany rate the Second Reformed Wesleyans got him, and his entirekingdom went Wesleyan. The pioneer Wesleyan missionary he actuallymade prime minister, and what he did to the trading crowd was acaution. Why, in the end, King John's kingdom was blacklisted andboycotted by the traders till the revenues diminished to zero, thepeople went bankrupt, and King John couldn't borrow a shilling fromhis most powerful chief."By this time he was getting old, and philosophic, and tolerant,and spiritually atavistic. He fired out the Second ReformedWesleyans, called back the exiles from Samoa, invited in thetraders, held a general love-feast, took the lid off, proclaimedreligious liberty and high tariff, and as for himself went back tothe worship of his ancestors, dug up the idols, reinstated a fewoctogenarian priests, and observed the tabus. All of which waslovely for the traders, and prosperity reigned. Of course, most ofhis subjects followed him back into heathen worship. Yet quite asprinkling of Catholics, Methodists and Wesleyans remained true totheir beliefs and managed to maintain a few squalid, one-horsechurches. But King John didn't mind, any more than did he the hightimes of the traders along the beach. Everything went, so long asthe taxes were paid. Even when his wife, Queen Mamare, elected tobecome a Baptist, and invited in a little, weazened, sweet-spirited, club-footed Baptist missionary, King John did not object.All he insisted on was that these wandering religions should beself-supporting and not feed a pennyworth's out of the royalcoffers."And now the threads of my recital draw together in the paragon offemale exquisiteness - my Princess."Whiskers paused, placed carefully on the ground his half-fullcondensed milk can with which he had been absently toying, andkissed the fingers of his one hand audibly aloft."She was the daughter of Queen Mamare. She was the womanwonderful. Unlike the Diana type of Polynesian, she was almostethereal. She WAS ethereal, sublimated by purity, as shy andmodest as a violet, as fragile-slender as a lily, and her eyes,luminous and shrinking tender, were as asphodels on the sward ofheaven. She was all flower, and fire, and dew. Hers was thesweetness of the mountain rose, the gentleness of the dove. Andshe was all of good as well as all of beauty, devout in her beliefin her mother's worship, which was the worship introduced byEbenezer Naismith, the Baptist missionary. But make no mistake.She was no mere sweet spirit ripe for the bosom of Abraham. All ofexquisite deliciousness of woman was she. She was woman, allwoman, to the last sensitive quivering atom of her -"And I? I was a wastrel of the beach. The wildest was not so wildas I, the keenest not so keen, of all that wild, keen tradingcrowd. It was esteemed I played the stiffest hand of poker. I wasthe only living man, white, brown, or black, who dared run theKuni-kuni Passage in the dark. And on a black night I have done itunder reefs in a gale of wind. Well, anyway, I had a badreputation on a beach where there were no good reputations. I wasreckless, dangerous, stopped at nothing in fight or frolic; and thetrading captains used to bring boiler-sheeted prodigies from thevilest holes of the South Pacific to try and drink me under thetable. I remember one, a calcined Scotchman from the New Hebrides.It was a great drinking. He died of it, and we laded him aboardship, pickled in a cask of trade rum, and sent him back to his ownplace. A sample, a fair sample, of the antic tricks we cut up onthe beach of Manatomana."And of all unthinkable things, what did I up and do, one day, butlook upon the Princess to find her good and to fall in love withher. It was the real thing. I was as mad as a March hare, andafter that I got only madder. I reformed. Think of that! Thinkof what a slip of a woman can do to a busy, roving man! - By theLord Harry, it's true. I reformed. I went to church. Hear me! Ibecame converted. I cleared my soul before God and kept my hands -I had two then - off the ribald crew of the beach when it laughedat this, my latest antic, and wanted to know what was my game."I tell you I reformed, and gave myself in passion and sincerity toa religious experience that has made me tolerant of all religionever since. I discharged my best captain for immorality. So did Imy cook, and a better never boiled water in Manatomana. For thesame reason I discharged my chief clerk. And for the first time inthe history of trading my schooners to the westward carried Biblesin their stock. I built a little anchorite bungalow up town on amango-lined street squarely alongside the little house occupied byEbenezer Naismith. And I made him my pal and comrade, and foundhim a veritable honey pot of sweetnesses and goodnesses. And hewas a man, through and through a man. And he died long after likea man, which I would like to tell you about, were the tale of itnot so deservedly long."It was the Princess, more than the missionary, who was responsiblefor my expressing my faith in works, and especially in thatcrowning work, the New Church, Our Church, the Queen-mother'schurch."'Our poor church,' she said to me, one night after prayer-meeting.I had been converted only a fortnight. 'It is so small itscongregation can never grow. And the roof leaks. And King John,my hard-hearted father, will not contribute a penny. Yet he has abig balance in the treasury. And Manatomana is not poor. Muchmoney is made and squandered, I know. I hear the gossip of thewild ways of the beach. Less than a month ago you lost more in onenight, gambling at cards, than the cost of the upkeep of our poorchurch for a year.'"And I told her it was true, but that it was before I had seen thelight. (I'd had an infernal run of bad luck.) I told her I hadnot tasted liquor since, nor turned a card. I told her that theroof would be repaired at once, by Christian carpenters selected byher from the congregation. But she was filled with the thought ofa great revival that Ebenezer Naismith could preach - she was adear saint - and she spoke of a great church, saying:"'You are rich. You have many schooners, and traders in farislands, and I have heard of a great contract you have signed torecruit labour for the German plantations of Upolu. They say, nextto Sweitzer, you are the richest trader here. I should love to seesome use of all this money placed to the glory of God. It would bea noble thing to do, and I should be proud to know the man whowould do it.'"I told her that Ebenezer Naismith would preach the revival, andthat I would build a church great enough in which to house it."'As big as the Catholic church?' she asked."This was the ruined cathedral, built at the time when the entirepopulation was converted, and it was a large order; but I was afirewith love, and I told her that the church I would build would beeven bigger."'But it will take money,' I explained. 'And it takes time to makemoney.'"'You have much,' she said. 'Some say you have more money than myfather, the King."'I have more credit,' I explained. 'But you do not understandmoney. It takes money to have credit. So, with the money I have,and the credit I have, I will work to make more money and credit,and the church shall be built.'"Work! I was a surprise to myself. It is an amazement, the amountof time a man finds on his hands after he's given up carousing, andgambling, and all the time-eating diversions of the beach. And Ididn't waste a second of all my new-found time. Instead I workedit overtime. I did the work of half a dozen men. I became adriver. My captains made faster runs than ever and earned biggerbonuses, as did my supercargoes, who saw to it that my schoonersdid not loaf and dawdle along the way. And I saw to it that mysupercargoes did see to it."And good! By the Lord Harry I was so good it hurt. My consciencegot so expansive and fine-strung it lamed me across the shouldersto carry it around with me. Why, I even went back over my accountsand paid Sweitzer fifty quid I'd jiggered him out of in a deal inFiji three years before. And I compounded the interest as well."Work! I planted sugar cane - the first commercial planting onManatomana. I ran in cargoes of kinky-heads from Malaita, which isin the Solomons, till I had twelve hundred of the blackbirdsputting in cane. And I sent a schooner clear to Hawaii to bringback a dismantled sugar mill and a German who said he knew thefield-end of cane. And he did, and he charged me three hundreddollars screw a month, and I took hold of the mill-end. Iinstalled the mill myself, with the help of several mechanics Ibrought up from Queensland."Of course there was a rival. His name was Motomoe. He was thevery highest chief blood next to King John's. He was full native,a strapping, handsome man, with a glowering way of showing hisdislikes. He certainly glowered at me when I began hanging aroundthe palace. He went back in my history and circulated the blackesttales about me. The worst of it was that most of them were true.He even made a voyage to Apia to find things out - as if hecouldn't find a plenty right there on the beach of Manatomana! Andhe sneered at my failing for religion, and at my going to prayer-meeting, and, most of all, at my sugar-planting. He challenged meto fight, and I kept off of him. He threatened me, and I learnedin the nick of time of his plan to have me knocked on the head.You see, he wanted the Princess just as much as I did, and I wantedher more."She used to play the piano. So did I, once. But I never let herknow after I'd heard her play the first time. And she thought herplaying was wonderful, the dear, fond girl! You know the sort, themechanical one-two-three tum-tum-tum school-girl stuff. And nowI'll tell you something funnier. Her playing WAS wonderful to me.The gates of heaven opened to me when she played. I can see myselfnow, worn out and dog-tired after the long day, lying on the matsof the palace veranda and gazing upon her at the piano, myself in aperfect idiocy of bliss. Why, this idea she had of her fineplaying was the one flaw in her deliciousness of perfection, and Iloved her for it. It kind of brought her within my human reach.Why, when she played her one-two-three, tum-tum-tum, I was in theseventh heaven of bliss. My weariness fell from me. I loved her,and my love for her was clean as flame, clean as my love for God.And do you know, into my fond lover's fancy continually intrudedthe thought that God in most ways must look like her." - That's right, Bruce Cadogan Cavendish, sneer as you like. ButI tell you that's love that I've been describing. That's all.It's love. It's the realest, purest, finest thing that can happento a man. And I know what I'm talking about. It happened to me."Whiskers, his beady squirrel's eye glittering from out his ruinedeyebrow like a live coal in a jungle ambush, broke off long enoughto down a sedative draught from his condensed milk can and to mixanother."The cane," he resumed, wiping his prodigious mat of face hair withthe back of his hand. "It matured in sixteen months in thatclimate, and I was ready, just ready and no more, with the mill forthe grinding. Naturally, it did not all mature at once, but I hadplanted in such succession that I could grind for nine monthssteadily, while more was being planted and the ratoons werespringing up."I had my troubles the first several days. If it wasn't one thingthe matter with the mill, it was another. On the fourth day,Ferguson, my engineer, had to shut down several hours in order toremedy his own troubles. I was bothered by the feeder. Afterhaving the niggers (who had been feeding the cane) pour cream oflime on the rollers to keep everything sweet, I sent them out tojoin the cane-cutting squads. So I was all alone at that end, justas Ferguson started up the mill, just as I discovered what was thematter with the feed-rollers, and just as Motomoe strolled up."He stood there, in Norfolk jacket, pigskin puttees, and all therest of the fashionable get-up out of a bandbox, sneering at mecovered with filth and grease to the eyebrows and looking like anavvy. And, the rollers now white from the lime, I'd just seenwhat was wrong. The rollers were not in plumb. One side crushedthe cane well, but the other side was too open. I shoved myfingers in on that side. The big, toothed cogs on the rollers didnot touch my fingers. And yet, suddenly, they did. With the gripof ten thousand devils, my finger-tips were caught, drawn in, andpulped to - well, just pulp. And, like a slick of cane, I hadstarted on my way. There was no stopping me. Ten thousand horsescould not have pulled me back. There was nothing to stop me.Hand, arm, shoulder, head, and chest, down to the toes of me, I wasdoomed to feed through."It did hurt. It hurt so much it did not hurt me at all. Quitedetached, almost may I say, I looked on my hand being ground up,knuckle by knuckle, joint by joint, the back of the hand, thewrist, the forearm, all in order slowly and inevitably feeding in.O engineer hoist by thine own petard! O sugar-maker crushed bythine own cane-crusher!"Motomoe sprang forward involuntarily, and the sneer was chasedfrom his face by an expression of solicitude. Then the beauty ofthe situation dawned on him, and he chuckled and grinned. No, Ididn't expect anything of him. Hadn't he tried to knock me on thehead? What could he do anyway? He didn't know anything aboutengines."I yelled at the top of my lungs to Ferguson to shut off theengine, but the roar of the machinery drowned my voice. And thereI stood, up to the elbow and feeding right on in. Yes, it didhurt. There were some astonishing twinges when special nerves wereshredded and dragged out by the roots. But I remember that I wassurprised at the time that it did not hurt worse."Motomoe made a movement that attracted my attention. At the sametime he growled out loud, as if he hated himself, 'I'm a fool.'What he had done was to pick up a cane-knife - you know the kind,as big as a machete and as heavy. And I was grateful to him inadvance for putting me out of my misery. There wasn't any sense inslowly feeding in till my head was crushed, and already my arm waspulped half way from elbow to shoulder, and the pulping was goingright on. So I was grateful, as I bent my head to the blow."'Get your head out of the way, you idiot!' he barked at me."And then I understood and obeyed. I was a big man, and he tooktwo hacks to do it; but he hacked my arm off just outside theshoulder and dragged me back and laid me down on the cane."Yes, the sugar paid - enormously; and I built for the Princess thechurch of her saintly dream, and . . . she married me."He partly assuaged his thirst, and uttered his final word."Alackaday! Shuttlecock and battle-dore. And this at, the end ofit all, lined with boilerplate that even alcohol will not corrodeand that only alcohol will tickle. Yet have I lived, and I kiss myhand to the dear dust of my Princess long asleep in the greatmausoleum of King John that looks across the Vale of Manona to thealien flag that floats over the bungalow of the British GovernmentHouse. . . "Fatty pledged him sympathetically, and sympathetically drank out ofhis own small can. Bruce Cadogan Cavendish glared into the firewith implacable bitterness. He was a man who preferred to drink byhimself. Across the thin lips that composed the cruel slash of hismouth played twitches of mockery that caught Fatty's eye. AndFatty, making sure first that his rock-chunk was within reach,challenged."Well, how about yourself, Bruce Cadogan Cavendish? It's yourturn."The other lifted bleak eyes that bored into Fatty's until hephysically betrayed uncomfortableness."I've lived a hard life," Slim grated harshly. "What do I knowabout love passages?""No man of your build and make-up could have escaped them," Fattywheedled."And what of it?" Slim snarled. "It's no reason for a gentleman toboast of amorous triumphs.""Oh, go on, be a good fellow," Fatty urged. "The night's stillyoung. We've still some drink left. Delarouse and I havecontributed our share. It isn't often that three real ones like usget together for a telling. Surely you've got at least oneadventure in love you aren't ashamed to tell about - "Bruce Cadogan Cavendish pulled forth his iron quoit and seemed todebate whether or not he should brain the other. He sighed, andput back the quoit."Very well, if you will have it," he surrendered with manifestreluctance. "Like you two, I have had a remarkable constitution.And right now, speaking of armour-plate lining, I could drink theboth of you down when you were at your prime. Like you two, mybeginnings were far distant and different. That I am marked withthe hall-mark of gentlehood there is no discussion . . . unlesseither of you care to discuss the matter now . . . "His one hand slipped into his pocket and clutched the quoit.Neither of his auditors spoke nor betrayed any awareness of hismenace."It occurred a thousand miles to the westward of Manatomana, on theisland of Tagalag," he continued abruptly, with an air of saturninedisappointment in that there had been no discussion. "But first Imust tell you of how I got to Tagalag. For reasons I shall notmention, by paths of descent I shall not describe, in the crown ofmy manhood and the prime of my devilishness in which Oxfordrenegades and racing younger sons had nothing on me, I found myselfmaster and owner of a schooner so well known that she shall remainhistorically nameless. I was running blackbird labour from thewest South Pacific and the Coral Sea to the plantations of Hawaiiand the nitrate mines of Chili - ""It was you who cleaned out the entire population of - " Fattyexploded, ere he could check his speech.The one hand of Bruce Cadogan Cavendish flashed pocketward andflashed back with the quoit balanced ripe for business."Proceed," Fatty sighed. "I . . . I have quite forgotten what Iwas going to say.""Beastly funny country over that way," the narrator drawled withperfect casualness. "You've read this Sea Wolf stuff - ""You weren't the Sea Wolf," Whiskers broke in with involuntarypositiveness."No, sir," was the snarling answer. "The Sea Wolf's dead, isn'the? And I'm still alive, aren't I?""Of course, of course," Whiskers conceded. "He suffocated head-first in the mud off a wharf in Victoria a couple of years back.""As I was saying - and I don't like interruptions," Bruce CadoganCavendish proceeded, "it's a beastly funny country over that way.I was at Taki-Tiki, a low island that politically belongs to theSolomons, but that geologically doesn't at all, for the Solomonsare high islands. Ethnographically it belongs to Polynesia,Melanesia, and Micronesia, because all the breeds of the SouthPacific have gravitated to it by canoe-drift and intricately,degeneratively, and amazingly interbred. The scum of the scrapingsof the bottom of the human pit, biologically speaking, resides inTaka-Tiki. And I know the bottom and whereof I speak."It was a beastly funny time of it I had, diving out shell, fishingbeche-de-mer, trading hoop-iron and hatchets for copra and ivory-nuts, running niggers and all the rest of it. Why, even in Fijithe Lotu was having a hard time of it and the chiefs still eatinglong-pig. To the westward it was fierce - funny little blackkinky-heads, man-eaters the last Jack of them, and the jackpot fatand spilling over with wealth - ""Jack-pots?" Fatty queried. At sight of an irritable movement, headded: "You see, I never got over to the West like Delarouse andyou.""They're all head-hunters. Heads are valuable, especially a whiteman's head. They decorate the canoe-houses and devil-devil houseswith them. Each village runs a jack-pot, and everybody antes.Whoever brings in a white man's head takes the pot. If therearen't openers for a long time, the pot grows to tremendousproportions. Beastly funny, isn't it?"I know. Didn't a Holland mate die on me of blackwater? Anddidn't I win a pot myself? It was this way. We were lying atLango-lui at the time. I never let on, and arranged the affairwith Johnny, my boat-steerer. He was a kinky-head himself fromPort Moresby. He cut the dead mate's head off and sneaked ashorein the might, while I whanged away with my rifle as if I weretrying to get him. He opened the pot with the mate's head, and gotit, too. Of course, next day I sent in a landing boat, with twocovering boats, and fetched him off with the loot.""How big was the pot?" Whiskers asked. "I heard of a pot at Orlaworth eighty quid.""To commence with," Slim answered, "there were forty fat pigs, eachworth a fathom of prime shell-money, and shell-money worth a quid afathom. That was two hundred dollars right there. There wereninety-eight fathoms of shell-money, which is pretty close to fivehundred in itself. And there were twenty-two gold sovereigns. Isplit it four ways: one-fourth to Johnny, one-fourth to the ship,one-fourth to me as owner, and one-fourth to me as skipper. Johnnynever complained. He'd never had so much wealth all at one time inhis life. Besides, I gave him a couple of the mate's old shirts.And I fancy the mate's head is still there decorating the canoe-house.""Not exactly Christian burial of a Christian," Whiskers observed."But a lucrative burial," Slim retorted. "I had to feed the restof the mate over-side to the sharks for nothing. Think of feedingan eight-hundred-dollar head along with it. It would have beencriminal waste and stark lunacy."Well, anyway, it was all beastly funny, over there to thewestward. And, without telling you the scrape I got into at Taki-Tiki, except that I sailed away with two hundred kinky-heads forQueensland labour, and for my manner of collecting them had twoBritish ships of war combing the Pacific for me, I changed mycourse and ran to the westward thinking to dispose of the lot tothe Spanish plantations on Bangar."Typhoon season. We caught it. The MERRY MIST was my schooner'sname, and I had thought she was stoutly built until she hit thattyphoon. I never saw such seas. They pounded that stout craft topieces, literally so. The sticks were jerked out of her,deckhouses splintered to match-wood, rails ripped off, and, afterthe worst had passed, the covering boards began to go. We justmanaged to repair what was left of one boat and keep the schoonerafloat only till the sea went down barely enough to get away. Andwe outfitted that boat in a hurry. The carpenter and I were thelast, and we had to jump for it as he went down. There were onlyfour of us - ""Lost all the niggers?" Whiskers inquired."Some of them swam for some time," Slim replied. "But I don'tfancy they made the land. We were ten days' in doing it. And wehad a spanking breeze most of the way. And what do you think wehad in the boat with us? Cases of square-face gin and cases ofdynamite. Funny, wasn't it? Well, it got funnier later on. Oh,there was a small beaker of water, a little salt horse, and somesalt-water-soaked sea biscuit - enough to keep us alive to Tagalag."Now Tagalag is the disappointingest island I've ever beheld. Itshows up out of the sea so as you can make its fall twenty milesoff. It is a volcano cone thrust up out of deep sea, with asegment of the crater wall broken out. This gives sea entrance tothe crater itself, and makes a fine sheltered harbour. And that'sall. Nothing lives there. The outside and the inside of thecrater are too steep. At one place, inside, is a patch of about athousand coconut palms. And that's all, as I said, saving a fewinsects. No four-legged thing, even a rat, inhabits the place.And it's funny, most awful funny, with all those coconuts, not evena coconut crab. The only meat-food living was schools of mullet inthe harbour - fattest, finest, biggest mullet I ever laid eyes on."And the four of us landed on the little beach and set uphousekeeping among the coconuts with a larder full of dynamite andsquare-face. Why don't you laugh? It's funny, I tell you. Try itsome time. - Holland gin and straight coconut diet. I've neverbeen able to look a confectioner's window in the face since. NowI'm not strong on religion like Chauncey Delarouse there, but Ihave some primitive ideas; and my concept of hell is an illimitablecoconut plantation, stocked with cases of square-face and populatedby ship-wrecked mariners. Funny? It must make the devil scream."You know, straight coconut is what the agriculturists call anunbalanced ration. It certainly unbalanced our digestions. We gotso that whenever hunger took an extra bite at us, we took anotherdrink of gin. After a couple of weeks of it, Olaf, a squareheadsailor, got an idea. It came when he was full of gin, and we,being in the same fix, just watched him shove a cap and short fuseinto a stick of dynamite and stroll down toward the boat."It dawned on me that he was going to shoot fish if there were anyabout; but the sun was beastly hot, and I just reclined there andhoped he'd have luck."About half an hour after he disappeared we heard the explosion.But he didn't come back. We waited till the cool of sunset, anddown on the beach found what had become of him. The boat was thereall right, grounded by the prevailing breeze, but there was noOlaf. He would never have to eat coconut again. We went back,shakier than ever, and cracked another square-face."The next day the cook announced that he would rather take hischance with dynamite than continue trying to exist on coconut, andthat, though he didn't know anything about dynamite, he knew asight too much about coconut. So we bit the detonator down forhim, shoved in a fuse, and picked him a good fire-stick, while hejolted up with a couple more stiff ones of gin."It was the same programme as the day before. After a while weheard the explosion and at twilight went down to the boat, fromwhich we scraped enough of the cook for a funeral."The carpenter and I stuck it out two days more, then we drewstraws for it and it was his turn. We parted with harsh words; forhe wanted to take a square-face along to refresh himself by theway, while I was set against running any chance of wasting the gin.Besides, he had more than he could carry then, and he wobbled andstaggered as he walked."Same thing, only there was a whole lot of him left for me to bury,because he'd prepared only half a stick. I managed to last it outtill next day, when, after duly fortifying myself, I got sufficientcourage to tackle the dynamite. I used only a third of a stick -you know, short fuse, with the end split so as to hold the head ofa safety match. That's where I mended my predecessors' methods.Not using the match-head, they'd too-long fuses. Therefore, whenthey spotted a school of mullet; and lighted the fuse, they had tohold the dynamite till the fuse burned short before they threw it.If they threw it too soon, it wouldn't go off the instant it hitthe water, while the splash of it would frighten the mullet away.Funny stuff dynamite. At any rate, I still maintain mine was thesafer method."I picked up a school of mullet before I'd been rowing fiveminutes. Fine big fat ones they were, and I could smell them overthe fire. When I stood up, fire-stick in one hand, dynamite stickin the other, my knees were knocking together. Maybe it was thegin, or the anxiousness, or the weakness and the hunger, and maybeit was the result of all of them, but at any rate I was all of ashake. Twice I failed to touch the fire-stick to the dynamite.Then I did, heard the match-head splutter, and let her go."Now I don't know what happened to the others, but I know what Idid. I got turned about. Did you ever stem a strawberry and throwthe strawberry away and pop the stem into your mouth? That's whatI did. I threw the fire-stick into the water after the mullet andheld on to the dynamite. And my arm went off with the stick whenit went off. . . . "Slim investigated the tomato-can for water to mix himself a drink,but found it empty. He stood up."Heigh ho," he yawned, and started down the path to the river.In several minutes he was back. He mixed the due quantity of riverslush with the alcohol, took a long, solitary drink, and staredwith bitter moodiness into the fire."Yes, but . . . " Fatty suggested. "What happened then?""Oh," sad Slim. "Then the princess married me, of course.""But you were the only person left, and there wasn't any princess .. . " Whiskers cried out abruptly, and then let his voice trailaway to embarrassed silence.Slim stared unblinkingly into the fire.Percival Delaney and Chauncey Delarouse looked at each other.Quietly, in solemn silence, each with his one arm aided the one armof the other in rolling and tying his bundle. And in silence,bundles slung on shoulders, they went away out of the circle offirelight. Not until they reached the top of the railroadembankment did they speak."No gentleman would have done it," said Whiskers."No gentleman would have done it," Fatty agreed.Glen Ellen, California,SEPTEMBER 26, 1916.
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