Part 22 (1/2)
I quietly pulled up the anchor, and let the canoe drift towards the mainland. I did not care about visiting the scene of the fight as I had no arms with me, and learnt by experience the folly of meddling with the Pleasant islanders when they were sober. When they were drunk I knew that they would as soon cut my throat as not.
I mentioned this matter to the Captain on my next visit. He told me with a grim smile that he knew there had been a fight up the lagoon; so much the better, as he found the Pleasant islanders harder to manage every day, and the sooner their number was reduced the better.
One day, when Kusis and I were coming across the lagoon with some pigeons I had shot, we met the Pingelap girl, Peloa, paddling a canoe furiously, her plump face showing great excitement. ”She had been sent for us,” she said, ”by the Captain. There was a sail in sight. I was to hasten back to Mout, where I would find a boat outside the reef which he had sent down for me. I was to try and board the s.h.i.+p, in case he could not do so from Utw, and tell the master that a s.h.i.+pwrecked crew were on the island.”
Peloa hauled her canoe up on a little beach, and got in with us. We three then paddled along till we got abreast of the two islets near Mout. We then saw a whaleboat coming round the point with a lug sail.
She soon ran in for me, and I found she was manned by Pleasant islanders, who told me that the s.h.i.+p was coming round the point, about three miles off the land.
There was a strong breeze, and we slipped through the water at a great rate so as to meet the s.h.i.+p. As soon as we cleared the point I saw her coming down before the wind about two miles distant.
She was a large s.h.i.+p, and was running straight for us with her yards squared. At first I thought she had seen us, but she kept steadily on her course. Then I saw her take in her light sails and heave to.
Standing up in the boat, I could distinguish a whaleboat under a fore and aft sail close to her. Behind this boat were two others, which, from their black paint and peculiarly-cut sails, I knew to be those the Captain had at Utw.
The s.h.i.+p lay to till the first whaleboat boarded her, and then, to my great surprise, the yards were swung round, the light sails again set, and she stood on her course, but kept the wind more on her quarter so as to make the most of the breeze.
By this time I had got almost within hailing distance of the s.h.i.+p. She was deep in the water, and was, I supposed, some coal-laden s.h.i.+p bound from New South Wales to China, which had taken the outside or easier route to her destination. When the whaleboat lowered her sail and ran alongside, I saw that she was the king's new boat, and contained but two men. These, my crew said, looked like the two deserters from the _St.
George_. As soon as they got on board the boat was hoisted in without delay, and, as I have said, the s.h.i.+p kept on her course.
It was of no use attempting to overtake her, as she was travelling now about twelve knots, so I signalled for the other two boats, and they ran down after us till we got under the lee of the land again in smooth water.
The men in these boats told me the following tale:--About daylight that morning the king's whaleboat, which was anch.o.r.ed in Utw harbour, was found to be missing. The two deserters from the _St. George_ were also gone. Captain Hayston instantly offered to send his boat in pursuit of the runaways, and curiously, just as they were being launched, there came a cry of ”Sail ho.” The Captain then saw the s.h.i.+p a long way off, and told the crews to try and board her, and get her to run in close to the land, and that he would then come off himself. In the mean time he manned one of the trader's whaleboats with a native crew, and sent her round to Coquille to pick me up, as he fancied the s.h.i.+p would be easier boarded from there than from Utw. The three boats left together, two standing right out to sea, and the other running down the coast to pick me up.
When the two boats were within three miles of the s.h.i.+p, they noticed the fore and aft sail of the king's whaleboat showing up now and then as she rose and sunk again in the heavy swell, and noticed that she was also heading to meet the s.h.i.+p. The rest I had observed myself.
I suspected something from the manner of the c.o.xswain in charge of the king's two boats, but did not question him, and telling him to give the Captain full particulars of our endeavour to board the s.h.i.+p, I got ash.o.r.e in a smooth part of the reef, and walked back to Mout, where I found the villagers in a great state of excitement, under the impression that I had gone away in the s.h.i.+p.
Hayston afterwards admitted that he had supplied the deserters with s.e.xtant, compa.s.s, and chart, had also given them provisions, and fifty dollars in money. They promised him to make straight for Ponap, and wait there till some Californian s.h.i.+p called, which they would endeavour to charter, on the part of Hayston, to beat up to Strong's Island, and take us all away to Providence Island. Barney was a good navigator, and could he only have kept fairly sober would have long since had a s.h.i.+p of his own. He eagerly accepted the Captain's offer, and the next morning the crew of the king's whaleboat found she had disappeared; then followed the strange series of events by which Barney and his mate got on board the s.h.i.+p and evaded pursuit.
Barney was a highly intelligent individual, as the sequel will show, and was capable of making a rapid calculation of probabilities. He afterwards visited Samoa, and gave this account of his escape.
He said that when the Captain provided him with ”a jewel of a whaleboat,” he honestly intended to fulfil his promises. He lost some time in trying to persuade a native girl named Luta to share his fortunes, but she was afraid of a long voyage in a small boat. His pleadings, moreover, were cut short by the Captain, who told him to hurry up, and get out of the harbour before daylight.
As soon, then, as Barney sighted the s.h.i.+p a plan suggested itself to him. Once on deck he introduced himself to the Captain as ”Captain Casey,” and said, ”For heaven's sake, sir, don't delay another moment.
There are two boat-loads of b.l.o.o.d.y, cut-throat pirates coming after me, and they mane to take the s.h.i.+p! Have you never heard of 'Bully Hayston'?”
The skipper _had_ heard of him,--things true, and untrue likewise. Then Barney told him a tale of how the _Leonora_ had been wrecked on the island, and that ever since the fierce Captain and crew had planned to cut off the first s.h.i.+p that touched at the island--that he (Barney) and his mate had owned a small trading cutter, which Hayston had seized two days ago--but that he had managed to escape with one of his men, and thanked G.o.d that he was able to reach the s.h.i.+p in time, and save every one's throat from being cut.
The s.h.i.+p's captain took all this in; Barney's boat was hoisted in, and the s.h.i.+p kept away. The two boats, with their crews of excited natives yelling and shouting, gave colour to Barney's narrative, and when he pointed to my boat, and said, ”Holy saints! there's another of the villains coming out under the lee side with a boat-load of pirates too,”
the captain's funk was complete. He landed Barney and his companion at Ponap, and, purely out of compa.s.sion, bought the king's whaleboat and her contents for a hundred dollars, so that Mr. Barney landed there with a hundred and fifty dollars in his pocket, and got a free pa.s.sage later on to Manila as a distressed American seaman.
The Captain took matters philosophically when the boats returned, saying that he never had expected to see Barney again. After which he resumed his oil-making and the government of his ”kingdom by the sea” as usual.
As for me, my life was a quiet, deeply enjoyable one. I began at times to doubt whether I should ever wish to change it. But against this phase of lotus-eating contentment arose from time to time a haunting dread, lest by evil chance I should ever sink down into the position of those renegades from civilisation, whom I had known, in the strange world of ”The Islands,” and as often pitied or despised. In this Robinson Crusoe existence I even felt a mild interest in the three cattle that we had landed at Utw.