Wild Justice: Stories of the South Seas Part 18

But that didn't seem to soothe him any, and he quavered out he would be better where he was. But I said they'd rummage the whole island upside down before they were done, and all he had to do was to lay low, not worry, and let me and Tom handle the thing for him.

He reached down his hand through the trap, and I shook it, he saying, "G.o.d bless you, Bill--G.o.d bless you!" And then it went shut, and I heard him blow out the lamp.

The next step was to take my old girl into the secret, she being a Tongan, as I've already said, and as true as steel. She didn't say much, but I guess it would have done Old Dibs good to have seen her eyes flash, and the way her teeth grit, and how quick she was to understand her part--which was, to pack his clothes in camphor-wood chests under a top dressing of trade. Old Dibs made no bones about giving her the keys, while I took it on myself to tell Iosefo the enemy had arrived, and he'd better move about the village warning everybody of the fack. It was well I did so, for Phelps and Nettles.h.i.+p and the rest come ash.o.r.e soon afterwards with their pockets full of trifles for the children and the girls, and they strolled about the settlement, stopping to rest and drink cocoanuts in the different houses. Phelps had brought the photograph along and showed it right and left, asking if they had ever seen anybody like that. I guess some of them would have cried out if it hadn't been for the pastor joining the party, like he wanted to do the honors of the island, telling the natives beforehand about the photograph, and shooing off the children when they come too close to it.

The whites probably thought he was talking what nice folks they were, for he had a kind of bland missionary way of talking, though he was really calling them the sons of Belial, and saying how the person who gave Old Dibs away would have his house burned and go to h.e.l.l.

The pastor did yeoman's service that day, and at sundown they all went back to their s.h.i.+p, very grumpy and dissatisfied, returning no wiser than when they'd come. Iosefo held a service afterwards to rub it in, and the king spoke at it, and likewise the chiefs, and so in our different ways we all pulled together for the common good. They had quite a jollification that night on the schooner, singing songs and playing some kind of a hurdy-gurdy on deck, and the sound of it come over the water very pleasant to hear. I sneaked off in a canoe toward ten o'clock, to make sure it wasn't a blind, but there was no mis...o...b..ing what they were up to. They were all drunk, and getting drunker, and I couldn't but think what a poor, tipsifying set of sleuths they were, and how different from Sherlock Holmes in the book. I lay for nearly an hour under their quarter, to hear what I could hear, and all I got was the odds and ends of some s.m.u.tty stories, and once being very near spit on the head.

When I got back to the station there was Tom to meet me, it being eleven now, and the village fast asleep. We overhauled the gear to make sure it was all in order, Sarah making up a basket of provisions for the old man, together with his toothbrush, comb, panjammers, blanket, a demijohn of water, and a bottle of gin. She said he had eaten no dinner, groaning and carrying on awful, wanting her to shoot him with his pistol and end it all. But he seemed to have pulled himself together by the time we were ready, for he let himself down from the attic quite spry, and made us all laugh by the remarks he pa.s.sed. But one could see he just forced himself to do it, and his face looked powerful haggard and flabby in the lantern light, and he moved queer on his legs, like a push would have sent him over.

I had a little two-wheeled truck that I used about the store to run bags of sh.e.l.l about in, and copra, and on this we put the treasure, eight bags of it, each one as heavy as could be lifted comfortably. Old Dibs insisted on cutting one open and serving us out a double handful each, not forgetting a share for Tom's wife as well as mine, and saying, "Take it, and G.o.d bless you, my dear, kind friends!" We dropped it into my tool chest, and threw the key on the floor of the bedroom, meaning to divide up equal later on.

We rigged a sort of rope harness to the truck, giving Tom the handles to steer by, while Old Dibs, Sarah, and me did tandem in front. The boatswain's chair and the coil of Manila rope were lashed down on the load, as well as the basket of provisions, Sarah carrying the demijohn in her hand, Old Dibs the gin and "Under Two Flags," while I led the way with the lantern.

My, but we must have made a queer sight as we plowed through the darkness, Tom bearing down on the handles and fighting to keep the truck on an even keel, Old Dibs gramp.u.s.s.ing along as wheeler, and Sarah and me tugging like battery mules! Of course everybody knows that gold is heavy, but when you run into the hundred thousands it becomes pig-iron heavy, cannon heavy, house-and-lot-and-barn heavy! It nearly pulled the hearts out of us to keep that truck moving, specially in the sand before we struck a harder going.

I thought time and again it was going to prove the death of Old Dibs. He was always laying down in his harness like a done-up Eskimo dog in the pictures, and having to be fanned alive again. But when we'd propose to cut him out, he'd say No, and stagger to his feet, showing a splendid spirit and cart-horsing ahead till his poor old breath came in roars.

It was a thankful moment when we got to the tree, where me and Tom, after a spell of rest, jumped in together with a will. It was no slouch of a job to get that tackle in position, the block being iron shod and heavy, the rope inch Manila, and the night as black as the pit of Tophet. Tom went aloft first, with a coil of light line, having to feel his way for the place we had marked with the handkerchief, and threatening more than once to come down quicker than he had gone up. The handkerchief had rotted off, or blown away long since, and it bothered Tom not a little to find where it had been. But at last he did so, dropping his line for the lantern, according to the plan we had arranged beforehand, so as to avoid all shouting and noise. When he had placed the lantern to his satisfaction, the line came straggling down again for the block and the gear to make it fast with, and when this was done the inch Manila went up, and everything was ready.

It showed how well Tom and I had thought it out, that there wasn't a single hitch, except for the lantern blowing out and Tom having no matches, I going up to see what was delaying him, and having none neither. Then we changed places, Tom being a heavier man to pull, and I remaining aloft to handle the freight as it came along. They made the boatswain's chair fast below, and sent her up with the first load--two bags of coin--getting it on a level with the platform by the lantern marking the place. I stood on the platform and had no trouble in yanking the stuff in; and this went right along like a mail steamer, till it was all up, and it came old Dibs's turn.

But he just took one look at the boatswain's chair, and said "Nit,"

laying down on the ground when they tried to persuade him into it, and rolling over and over in desperation. We argufied over him for an hour, and it seemed all to no purpose, he refusing to budge an inch, saying he weighed two hundred and twenty pounds, and was better off in the attic.

Time was running away on us, and me and Tom got tired of saying the same things over and over, and always getting the same answers, and finally we lost our tempers, and said we'd go home. Then he said he'd come home, too, and we said No, we had washed our hands of him. Then he said he was only a poor old man and would blow his brains out, and we said he might, if he wanted to. Then, when we had gone about twenty paces, he come lumbering after us, saying, "For G.o.d's sake, stop!" and swearing he would go up peaceful, and make no more trouble.

We tied him in like a baby in a high chair, I going up to receive him, while my wife and Tom laid on to the rope with a yeo-heave-yeo under their breaths. All the fight had clean gone out of him, and the only thing he did was to squeal a little when he b.u.mped against the trunk, and tried to fill up with air to make himself lighter. But he reached the top all right, and I landed him very careful, he squatting down on the floor and saying, "Oh, my G.o.d!" I was too busy clearing away, and letting the block down to Tom, for me to hear much else he said, but when I was through and went to take a last look at him, he seemed quite snug and contented, and glad he had come. He shook hands very grateful, looking for me to come back the following night and report, I to make an owl signal like we had agreed on previously.

I wished him happy dreams, and come down, all three of us setting out for home with the truck and the gear, my wife in a tantrum at our having threatened to desert Old Dibs when he acted so cowardly. Tom made it worse by saying the Kanakas were losing all respeck for whites, and if _he_ was married to a Tongan, and was spoken to like that, he'd quit--by gum, that's what _he'd_ do! Then she said it would serve me right if she went away in the schooner with the white men, and I would never see her again. And I said, "Oh, dear, but I'd feel sorry for the white man that got you!" Then she said she'd give all the gold Old Dibs had made her a present of to be back home in Tonga; and then I said I'd gladly add mine to hers. And when Tom added his, I thought we were in for a race war.

We all got back pretty cross and tired, but a little beer put heart in us; and I pulled her down on my knee and said she was the only girl in the world, and that I wouldn't trade her for a ten-ton cutter; while Tom counted out the money Old Dibs had given us previous, and said we were all a pack of fools, and that he was as fond of Sarah as anybody. So peace descended like a beautiful vision, and there was four hundred and forty dollars for each of us, with a twenty over that we tossed for, and engineered to let Sarah win. Tom said we might shake hands on a good night's work, and went home in high spirits, jingling his money in a bandanner.

It wasn't long after breakfast the next morning when I heard a great stamping and tramping out in front, and there, if you please, was the whole schooner party, Phelps, Nettles.h.i.+p, the bookkeeper, and the captain. They had thrown off the mask now, and Phelps had a warrant a yard long for the apprehension of Runyon Rufe, which he read aloud to me, while the others listened with their hats off like it was church.

"I thought you gentlemen were in the guano business," says I, when he had finished.

"We're in the Runyon Rufe catching business," says Mr. Phelps, very genial, "and we trust you will not oppose the officers of the law in the exercise of their functions."

"I don't want to oppose anybody when it's four to one," says I, equally genial, "though may I make so bold as to inquire who is Runyon Rufe and what's he done?"

"Never heard of Runyon Rufe!" says Nettles.h.i.+p, like it was George Was.h.i.+ngton or Alfred the Great.

"Here it is, better than I can tell it," said Mr. Phelps, handing me a printed proclamation:

TEN THOUSAND POUNDS REWARD.

RUNYON RUFE, Banker and Company Promoter, wanted for gigantic frauds in connection with the Invincible Building Society, the Greater London Finance Syndicate, Suburbs Limited, and other undertakings. Fled to the United States, where he had previously put by sums aggregating two hundred thousand pounds; resisted extradition; forfeited his bail; was traced to Portland, Oregon, and thence to Penrhyn Island, South Pacific, where all clews as to his whereabouts were lost.

Aged sixty-three; height, five feet nine inches; imposing appearance; weight, fifteen stone and over; fair complexion; brown eyes, with bushy, gray eyebrows; scanty gray hair; of a plethoric habit, and with a noticeable hesitancy of speech. When last seen was well supplied with money, and was heard declaring his intention of making his way toward the lesser-traveled islands of the Pacific Ocean.

The above reward, in whole or in part, will be paid by Houghton & Cust, No. 318 George Street, Sydney, New South Wales, on receiving information that will lead to the arrest of the said Runyon Rufe.

Traders and others are cautioned against harboring the fugitive, or aiding and abetting his escape from the officers of justice.

I read it three times and then handed it back.

"Show me where to sign," says I.

"We have to go through the disagreeable formality of searching these premises," said Mr. Phelps, disregarding my joke, "and if you have no objections we shall begin now!"

"And suppose I _did_ have an objection?" I asked.

"We'd search them just the same," said Mr. Phelps, grinning.

I was in two minds what to do; but I noticed the bookkeeper's lip was cut, and there was dried blood on Mr. Nettles.h.i.+p's knuckles, and it didn't seem good enough. I saw they had begun on Tom first, and that decided me to take water with my formality.

"Walk in," says I.

They didn't wait for a second asking, and a minute later were poking and rummaging all through the place. They thought I might have hid him somewheres, and turned over everything to that end, not opening as much as a chest or pulling out a single drawer. It wasn't much pleasure to look on and see them doing it, but I had to take my medicine, and it was common sense to appear cheerful about it. They crawled into all kinds of places, and backed out of all kinds of others, and tapped the walls to see if any was hollow, and turned over sacks of pearl sh.e.l.l and copra, and sneezed and swore and burrowed and choked, till at last Mr. Phelps really found something, and that was a centipede that bit him. This brought them all out on the front veranda again, where I had to pretend I was sorry, which I was--for the centipede.

I asked what they were going to do next, and they said, "Get aboard and bathe it with ammoniar"; and I said, "No, I meant about Runyon Rufe"; and Mr. Phelps he give me a wicked look, and said that they'd lay him by the legs before long, together with a few white trading gentlemen, maybe, to keep him company; and I said, "Oh, dear, I hope that isn't any insinuation against present company!" and he said, "the present company might put the cap on if it fitted them"; and I said "if he couldn't keep a civil tongue in his head he had better get off my front stoop"; and he said "he wouldn't demean himself by bandying words with a beach-comber," and went off sucking his hand, with the others crowding around him, and asking him how it felt now.

I suspicioned there had been a leak somewheres, and was surer than ever when Tom came around with his eye bunged up where Nettles.h.i.+p had hit him. And it certainly looked black that they made no appearance of moving, raising an awning over the quarter-deck, and bringing up tables and swinging hammocks like it was for a week. The pastor had told Tom that one of the children had reckonized Old Dibs's photograph, and clapped his hands before he could be stopped, crying out, "Ona! Ona!"

the name Old Dibs went by among the Kanakas.

We put in a pretty anxious day, for they began a systematic prowl all over the island, obviously dividing out the territory and doing it simultaneous. That night they set a watch on my house and Tom's, the news coming in from Iosefo, who had spies out watching them. It was regular wheels within wheels, and I couldn't but wonder how poor Old Dibs was faring up his tree, waiting and waiting for us to come!

The next day they prowled harder than ever, this time the crew joining in, mate, cook, cabin boy, and four hands. Like was natural, they made me and Tom's first--the crew, I mean--and we both had the same happy thought, square-face. The mate went off with only three drinks in him, taking the cabin boy with two, but the rest of them sucked it in by the bucket, and the fartherest any of them got away was a hundred yards, and him with a bottle in his hand. They were a pretty ugly crowd by nightfall, refusing to go back to the s.h.i.+p when ordered, and roaring and yelling about the settlement to all hours. The afterguard still kept tab on me and Tom, however, and so yet another night pa.s.sed without our daring to make our date with Old Dibs. But in the morning they lost all patience, rounding up the crew with handspikes, and all going off to the schooner with half of them in irons. Phelps and Nettles.h.i.+p helped to get up anchor themselves, and toward nine o'clock we had the blessed sight of their heels, beating out of the lagoon against a stiff trade.

It was hard to have to wait the balance of the day doing nothing, for we might need the tree idea again, and it would have been a mug's game to have given away the secret to the Kanakas. Tom and me both felt considerable rocky, besides, from having drunk so much gin with the schooner's people; for though we had held back all we could, and had tipped our gla.s.ses on the sly, we couldn't seem too behindhand in whooping it up with them. But we were dead dogs now all right, and the main part of breakfast and dinner was the buckets of water we poured over each other's heads. It was what you might call a very long day, and it seemed like the sun would never set, for we were both of us in a sweat about Old Dibs, and more than anxious how he had made out.

Then sundown came, and dusk, and night itself, and still another long spell for the Kanakas to go to sleep, which it seemed as though they never would. Yes, a long day, and a long, long evening, and it was like a whole week had pa.s.sed before we stood under the tree and owly-owled to Old Dibs.

It was a mighty faint answer he gave back, and when me and Tom had rigged up the chair again we found we had a sick man on our hands. The exposure had nearly done for him; that, and the fear of being caught, and all the water having leaked out of the demijohn, which he had stood on its side the better to hide it. He was that weak he could hardly sit up, and was partly off his nut, besides, wanting to telephone at once to Longhurst, and mixing up Tom with the Public Prosecutor.

He would put his poor old trembling hand across his forehead like he was trying to wipe all this away, saying, "Is that you, Tom Riley?" and, "Bill, Bill," like that. It was no easy matter to get him down, for he almost needed to be lifted into the boatswain's chair, and couldn't as much as raise a little finger to help himself or hold on, and once we nearly spilled him out altogether. Fortunately, my old girl had brought some hot coffee in a beer bottle, and this was just like pouring new life down his throat. Our first business was to get him home and tuck him in, returning and making a second trip of the treasure, and winding up all serene about two in the morning, with Old Dibs sitting up in bed and eating fried eggs.

When Iosefo reported next morning, Old Dibs paid him a hundred dollars and dispensed with his services, saying that though he'd always be glad to see him around as a friend, he had no more call to keep him sitting on the chest. This made Tom and me feel good, for it showed he trusted us now, which he had never quite done before. In a day or two he was almost as lively as ever, out in the graveyard playing on his flute, and attending to church work on committee nights the same as before.

But there was a big change in him for all that, and me and Tom got it into our heads that he wasn't going to live very long, for he had that distressed look on his face that showed something wrong inside. He used to run on talking to himself half the night, and once he burst in to where I was asleep, saying he had seen me at the treasure chest, prizing off the lid, and what did I mean by it? After having lived together so long and comfortable, it wasn't very pleasant to see him going crazy on us--and going crazy that way--being suspicious we meant to rob and kill him, and all of us being in a conspiracy. He told the pastor he was afraid of his life of Tom and me, and if it wasn't for Iosefo he would be fearful to stay in my house a minute; and he told Tom _he_ was the only friend he had; and then said the same to me, warning me against Tom and Iosefo, saying they were at the winder every night trying to break in. And all this, maybe, on the very self-same day, the three of us comparing notes and wondering where it was all going to end.

It ended sooner than any of us expected; for one morning, when Sarah went to take him his coffee, his door was locked, and for all our hammering we couldn't raise a sound. I broke it in at last, expecting that he'd rise up and shoot me, and dodging when it went inward with a crash. But there was n.o.body to shoot, the room being stark empty, and the only thing of Old Dibs his clothes on a chair. We were at a loss what to do, and waited for half an hour, thinking he might turn up.

Then, real uneasy in our minds, we went out to look for him. He wasn't anywhere near the house or the beach, and as a last resort we went across the island to the graveyard, thinking perhaps he had taken it into his head to have a before-breakfast tootle on the flute. We found him, sure enough, in the middle of the graveyard, but laying forward in his old crimson dressing gown, dead.

Yes, sir, cold to the touch like it had been for hours, and holding a blackened lantern in his poor old fist--dead as dead--face down in the coral sand. We rolled him over to do what we could for him, but he had pa.s.sed to a place beyond help or hurt. I went back for Tom in a protuberation, saying, "My G.o.d! Tom, what do you think's happened?--Old Dibs's dead in the graveyard!" I guess the old man had never been so close to Tom as he had been to me, boarding in my house and almost a father to me and the wife, for Tom took it awful cool, and asked almost the first thing about the money.

"You and me will divide on that," he says.