The Girl Crusoes: A Story of the South Seas Read online

  "Not much to be afraid of, after all," said Tommy. "He looks hardlystrong enough to kill a fly."

  "How shall we speak to him?" said Elizabeth.

  "It will be rather a pantomime," rejoined Tommy. "Be very grave anddignified, Bess. Impress him with your importance, Queen Bess, monarchof all she surveys."

  "Don't be ridiculous, Tommy," said Elizabeth, feeling it was no timefor jesting. The old man certainly looked harmless enough, but she wasby no means easy in mind.

  After what seemed a long time, Fangati led the man up to the girls.

  "Bess, Mailee, Me Tommee," she said, pointing to each in turn.

  The old man made a salutation, and the girls looked at him withinterest. His face and every visible part of his body was hideouslytattooed, his thin bare legs looking as if they were covered withindigo-blue stockings. A stick was thrust cross-wise through his mopof grizzled hair. Certainly he was not a prepossessing object.

  The girls were wondering what they ought to do, when they weresurprised to hear the man address them.

  "I speak Inglis," he said; "I Maku. Good-day all-same velly much."

  Tommy turned aside so that her smile should not irritate or offend.

  Elizabeth, with admirable composure, said--

  "How do you do, Mr. Maku! Fangati is your granddaughter, I suppose?"

  It was at once clear that Maku's English was not very abundant. Theword grand-daughter puzzled him. He looked at Fangati dully; then hiseyes suddenly brightened.

  "Fangati, he my son chile," he said. "He velly good chile. He getplenty piecee me eat. To-mollow he go; I velly solly, eh! eh! I cly."

  Elizabeth in her turn was puzzled, and it was Mary who first saw theold man's meaning.

  "He says that Fangati got him plenty to eat, but disappeared one day,and he was very sorry, and cried."

  "No wonder, poor old man!" cried Tommy. "He looks half-starved.There's no one else living in their hut, then?"

  "Have you wife, children, friends?" asked Elizabeth.

  The old man shook his head.

  "Wife he dead long-timey. Chil'en big long way." He waved his arm toindicate distance. "Plen: ah! mikinaly he plen; he all-same gone away;eh! eh! all-same dead."

  From this Mary made out that he had a missionary friend who had goneaway and might now be dead.

  A few more questions satisfied the girls that, as far as he knew, therewere no more natives on the island except himself and hisgranddaughter. Intensely relieved on this score, they were ready to behospitable, and to Fangati's delight, invited the man to come towardstheir hut and talk to them.

  Seated on the ground in front of the hut with the girls in theentrance, the old man related a story of which they understood littleat the time. It was some few days before Mary, thinking over what hehad said, and puzzling about it, arrived at something like a coherentnarrative. Even then she was only partially successful. What he hadtried to explain in his scanty English was as follows.

  He had been chief of a small island a day's paddling to the eastward.It was remote from the usual trade-tracks, and for this reason hadremained longer in heathendom and cannibalism than most of the PacificIslands. But a white missionary had at last come and taken up hisabode on the island, by whose skill in medicine, earnest teaching, andnoble character, Maku and some of his sons had been won over.

  There were certain soothsayers among the people, who hated the newteacher when they found their influence with the chief gone. Workingon the superstitions of the islanders, they secretly stirred up arevolt. But for the quickness of Fangati he would have been attackedand killed. She discovered what was going on, informed hergrandfather, and persuaded him to put to sea by night in a canoe, withthe intention of paddling to an island to the southward, where Makuwould find friends. Forced out of their course by wind and current,they were nearly exhausted when by good fortune they found themselveson the shore of this island. They landed, erected a hut, and had sincelived there, not caring to risk another voyage, and finding abundanceof food.

  Maku could not say how long he had been on the island, nor were thegirls able to discover whether his arrival had preceded or succeededtheirs. He told them that one day Fangati, who had been to gatherfruit, reported that she had seen white people. Though he thought shemust be mistaken, he bade her run away at once if she saw any oneagain, white or brown. He did not like white people. Since they cameto the Pacific the brown people had not been happy. They had beenforced to work; some had been taken from their own islands and carriedaway to toil on distant plantations; new diseases had been broughtamong them. He had one friend among the white people--the "mikinaly";he was a good man and did good things. He had taught Maku English.

  True, Fangati had said that the strangers she had seen were women; butMaku could not believe that white women could have come to this islandwithout white men. And he was desperately afraid of being betrayed tothe ill-disposed mystery men among his own people; for before he hadbeen long on the island he discovered that it was the scene of certainceremonies conducted by these mystery men. At long intervals, beforehe became a Christian, he had himself accompanied his people in solemnexpeditions to the island. The accession of a new chief was celebratedwith special rites; years and years before, in his heathen days, hisown accession had been marked by a great cannibal feast. He was muchafraid that white people might sell him to his revolted tribesmen, whowould make him a victim.

  When Fangati disappeared he was convinced that she had been captured bythe white people, and he would never see her again. He missed her verymuch, for, being old and infirm, he depended almost entirely on her forhis food. But when she suddenly returned and told him how she had beencarried out to sea while fishing, and how the white women had rescuedher and treated her kindly, he felt that he must make his presenceknown to them, and especially warn them of their danger.

  At this Elizabeth asked anxiously what danger was likely to assailthem. The man hesitated. Now that it had come to the point he seemedto be unwilling to say more. But at length he explained that the spotat which they had landed was the usual landing-place of his people whenthey came to visit the island, and all the ground between it and theridge was tapu. He struggled with his imperfect English in trying tomake clear to the girls what that meant. They understood at last thattheir side of the island was sacred; its grounds were only to betrodden when the people came to hold their ceremonies, and anybodytrespassing upon it would incur the wrath of the mystery men, and bringdown upon themselves a terrible punishment. The forbidden ground wasmarked off from the rest of the island by a line of poles set upon theridge. Maku confessed that he himself felt very uneasy at havingviolated the tapu; and Elizabeth, questioning him, found that beneathhis recently assumed Christianity there lay a deep stratum ofsuperstition. When the "mikinaly" was with him tapu had no horrors forhim; but the missionary had left his island some time before the risingtook place, and with the removal of his influence the chief hadrelapsed to some extent into the superstitions of his early manhood.

  The girls were not at first much alarmed at what he told them. Butwhen he added that his people would certainly choose another chief inhis place, and come to the island for the usual inaugural ceremonies,the thought of being discovered by the savages at such a time filledthem with dread. Their hut lay in the direct path of the procession tothe ridge; it could not escape detection, and they trembled at the ideaof falling into the hands of people who might be worked up to religiousfrenzy by their mystery men. To violate the tapu would be bad enoughfor a brown man; it would be worse for white people.

  Maku made a suggestion. Let them dismantle the hut, he said, destroyall traces of their occupation, and remove to the other side of theisland, where at least they would not have to reckon with the anger ofthe mystery men at finding them on forbidden ground. The girlsdiscussed the suggestion earnestly, and decided to follow his advice.It gave them a pang to pull down the little home to which they hadbecome accustomed: but
they lost no time in setting about it, carryingthe material down to the boat. Meanwhile, the old man and Fangatiscattered the stones of their oven, and tried to obliterate the signsof habitation. Maku shook his head when he saw the bleached grass onwhat had been the floor of the hut. Even in this land of quick growthit must take some time before so tell-tale an evidence was done away.

  It was decided that Elizabeth and Mary should row the boat round toMaku's landing-place with the canoe in tow, while Tommy walked with theold man across the island. The chief did not follow the long route upthe stream by which the girls had reached the ridge, but took a moreslanting course through a wild and rugged region which they had neverexplored. As they were crossing the ridge he pointed out to Tommy inthe distance the entrance to the great cave in which the ceremonies ofhis tribe were conducted. Tommy shivered; the thought of wild menengaged in mysterious rites terrified her imagination. Choosing asteep path that wound down the eastern side of the ridge, Maku led thetwo young girls to the open space near the waterfall, and in a fewminutes reached his hut. He and Fangati at once began to rig up nearby a temporary shelter for the English girls, and it was almostfinished by the time Elizabeth and Mary arrived.

  The girls were provided by their new friends with an excellent meal offish, breadfruit and other fruits, some of which were strange to them.Immediately afterwards, Maku and his granddaughter set to work to buildthem a hut in the native fashion. Elizabeth doubted whether they wouldlike a house which must be inevitably close and stuffy with a doorwayonly high enough to crawl through. Their own hut had been fresh andbreezy. But it seemed better to let the natives have their way. Theywould build much faster than the English girls; and if strange nativesshould make their appearance in this part of the island, they would notbe rendered suspicious as they might be if they saw a hut so differentfrom what they were accustomed to.

  The girls slept in their temporary shelter that night. They had losttheir fear of savage neighbours, but this had been replaced by a newfear of possible visitors from beyond. Tommy had asked Maku duringtheir walk whether there was any chance of a ship coming to the island.

  "No ship," he answered. "No come this side. Melican ship come onetime, my place; mikinaly come in Melican ship; all-same, no mo'e."

  CHAPTER XIX

  THE SHARK

  The change of circumstances pleased every one except Billy the parrot.He had never taken kindly to Fangati, but had always ruffled hisfeathers and squawked angrily when he saw her with Tommy. The girlslaughed at these manifestations of jealousy. But when Billy wasremoved from his home, and found that his mistress's attentions wereshared by still another person, he became sulky. He would sit on arock, or the bough of a tree, blinking his bead-like eyes andmaintaining a sullen and reproachful silence.

  Tommy was so much taken up with Fangati that it is to be feared shesomewhat neglected her old favourite, as was perfectly natural underthe circumstances. When Fangati and her grandfather had finished thenew hut, which occupied them only two days, the young girls wereconstantly together. Tommy, now that her fear of cannibal neighbourswas removed, became again the active, light-hearted, adventurous girlshe had ever been. She roamed all over the island with Fangati, noteven excepting the region of the tapu, for she found that the nativegirl was ready to go in any direction, provided she did not catch sightof the posts on the ridge. They discovered in company otherplantations of wholesome fruits, of kinds which Tommy already knew, andof others which were strange to her. Fangati showed her how to fish inthe native way with a spear of sharpened wood. At first Tommy wassceptical about this, declaring that with the line and hook she wouldcatch more fish than Fangati with the spear. But she soon found thatshe was quite wrong. Leaning over the edge of a rock, with her keeneyes fixed on the water, Fangati would plunge her spear rapidly, andscarcely ever failed to bring up a fish as large as Tommy caught, andmuch more quickly. Tommy tried to imitate her, and was exceedinglyproud when, after dozens of fruitless attempts, she succeeded inspearing her first fish.

  In the course of one of their early rambles the girls came to the pitinto which Tommy had fallen. Fangati was much interested in this,having never seen it before, and she ran to fetch her grandfather tothe spot. The girls asked him what was the purpose of the pit, and hethought at first that it had been dug as a storehouse for breadfruit.But when Tommy told him about the tunnel through which she had crawled,and of the hole in the wall at the farther end, he looked puzzled anddeclared that he would go down and see for himself. It did not takelong to construct a serviceable ladder with stout canes bound togetherwith creepers, and the whole party descended into the pit and followedTommy through the tunnel.

  Arriving at the end, Maku looked curiously over the ledge. Heexplained to the girls that the dim-lit space beyond was the cave inwhich the mystic ceremonies of his people were conducted. The reasonof the existence of the pit was now plain to him. There was atradition among his tribe that one of his predecessor chiefs had shownan extraordinary knowledge of some of the secret performances of themystery men at which he had not been present.

  "I unastan," said Maku. "He find hole; he look; oh! he say, dis fineplace fo' me. All-same he makee way dis side; makee pit; come 'long,listen, look see; eh, eh; he know all-same too much."

  His explanation was not very clear, but after a time the girlsunderstood that the former chief, having accidentally discovered thetunnel opening to the cave, had dug the pit so that he could approachit from the inland direction, and had thus provided himself with ameans of eavesdropping. Apparently he had covered the pit with a lightlattice-work--as the breadfruit pit was usually covered--and this inthe course of years had become overgrown with vegetation, so thatnobody could have suspected the hole beneath.

  On returning to the surface they pulled up the ladder and laid it amongthe trees near by. More than once during the succeeding days Tommy andFangati amused themselves by descending into the pit and chasing eachother in the darkness of the tunnel. They invented other amusements.Tommy ran races with Fangati, played at hide-and-seek in the woods,practised shying at cocoa-nuts. All the girls had swimmingcompetitions in the cove at low tide, and though the English girlsbecame very expert, they were no match for Fangati, who dived andgambolled in the water as though in her native element.

  In constant companionship with Fangati, they learnt in course of timemany native words, and she on her side picked up a smattering ofEnglish. They were thus able to communicate with her freely. Sheamused them by her mispronunciations. The letter r was astumbling-block. "Run" was always "lun"; "bekfas leady," she wouldsay; and she adopted from her grandfather the expression "all-same,"which she used frequently and in odd connections.

  "I lun all-same kick, Me Tommee," she would say, when Tommy had beatenher in a race; or if, in a game of hide-and-seek, it was Mary's turn tohide, "Mailee all-same hidee-sik," was her way of putting it.

  One day, having had no success at their usual fishing-place at themouth of the cove, Fangati proposed that she and Tommy should go to aspot about half-a-mile up the coast, where she had sometimes caughtfish before the girls came. Elizabeth had laid no restrictions onTommy as regards her fishing excursions, except that she had asked hernot to go out of sight of their little harbour. Remembering howFangati had been carried out to sea, she wished to guard against anyrepetition of that mishap.

  The spot to which Fangati pointed was beyond the usual limit. It wasnot, however, far distant from the shore, and Fangati had been muchfarther out when her canoe was caught by the current. Elizabeth hadgone with Mary into the interior to gather breadfruit, so that it wasimpossible to consult her; and Tommy, anxious to have some fish fordinner by the time her sisters returned, agreed to try the new place.

  They reached it in the canoe, Tommy paddling. It was a large flat rocka few hundred yards from the shore, with a deep pool on its inner side.There they had great success, in the course of half-an-hour spearingenough fish for several meals. Thoroughly satisfied, th
ey had justturned their canoe towards home when Tommy caught sight of a largeshape moving rapidly beneath the surface of the water.

  "Oh! what's that?" she cried.

  Almost before the words were out of her mouth the canoe quivered undera terrific shock. Then it was rocked violently to and fro, soviolently that the sea came over the gunwale and the girls had to throwthemselves on to the opposite side to prevent the slight craft fromoverturning. As they did this there was a sudden sharp sound as ofsomething snapping. Instantly the canoe turned over, and the girlsfound themselves in the sea.

  Fangati laughed.

  "All-same jolly fun," she said.

  Tommy was not so much amused. Being able to swim she did not mind thesudden bath; but all the fish were gone; the morning's work was thrownaway.

  Fangati quickly righted the canoe, and having clambered into it, helpedTommy to regain her place. There was, of course, a quantity of waterat the bottom of the little vessel.

  "What was it?" exclaimed Tommy, shaking the water from her head. "Wasit a shark?"

  Fangati looked about her. In a moment she pointed to a strange object,something like the end of a saw, projecting from the bottom of thecanoe. Tommy had never seen such a thing before. Stooping down, shepulled at it. It was loosely fixed, and came away in her hand.Instantly there was an inrush of water.

  "No, no, silly Billy," cried Fangati, using an expression she had heardTommy apply to the parrot.

  She snatched the broken sword of the sword-fish from Tommy's hand, andtried to replace it. But though she succeeded in wedging it into thewood, it failed to stop the hole entirely. Without loss of time sheseized her paddle and started for the shore, about a quarter of a miledistant. But the canoe had shipped a considerable quantity of water,and this was being continually increased by the inflow through theleak. It sunk lower and lower, and every minute answered less readilyto Fangati's paddle. It soon became clear to the girls that the canoemust sink long before they reached the shore. They could easily gainthe land by swimming, but the canoe could not be recovered if it sank.