- Nobody answered. Once more the engines were started, and the 'Scud' moved slowly—almost reluctantly, it seemed—towards the beach.
S SITTING in the sparse shade of the ruins of their first camp, with the painted natives squatting a short distance away, Biggles told Ginger why they had found it necessary to take the flying-boat to Rutuona, and their subsequent adventures, concluding with a description of the towing of the war canoe in the face of a stiff breeze. When he had finished Ginger told his own tale from the time he, Full Moon, and Shell-Breaker were trapped in the grotto by the shark, thus being effectively prevented from returning to the flying-boat. As far as the others were concerned this was the answer to a problem for which they had been unable to supply a reasonable solution. Shell-Breaker had told them a little, but his account had been so fantastic that they could hardly believe it. Ginger also told of the arrival of Castanelli, and his discovery of the pearls by means of the exposure of the biscuit-tin by the waves flung across the island by the hurricane. But when he came to the episode of his being thrown overboard from the schooner, with an iron pipe tied to his waist, Sandy interrupted.
`Here, wait a minute, young feller. Are you sure you didn't dream all this?' he demanded suspiciously.
Àsk Full Moon; she cut me loose and fished me up,' returned Ginger simply.
`Lush! I reckon you'll never go nearer to death and get back again,' declared Sandy.
`You're right,' agreed Ginger. 'I thought I was a goner. When we saw Castanelli coming back I thought it was about the last straw. Naturally we made for the grotto. Castanelli was blasting us out with dynamite when you arrived. Another five minutes and all you would have found of us was bits and pieces.'
`We heard the explosions and it hurried us up,' declared Biggles.
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`Well, that's all,' concluded Ginger. 'You saw the finish of the business.'
`Yes, that's all,' said Biggles quietly. 'After what you've been through I should think you'
ve pretty well had enough of the South Seas. We may as well get along home. It won't take us long to put the machine in order. I think we'd better taxi her back to Rutuona and do the repairs here. Of course, if any one feels like starting the whole thing afresh, and making another raid on the pearl-bed, I'm willing to fall in line. But that's really up to Sandy; he has the dangerous work to do.'
`Nay, laddie, it's up to you,' returned Sandy. 'You provide the cash, so it's your privilege to call the tune.'
Ìf only we had been able to save the pearls we should have been well out of the whole business, after all,' murmured Algy regretfully.
`That's true—but it isn't much use thinking about that,' answered Biggles. 'As far as pearls are concerned, we are where we started, but none of us has been hurt, and after the narrow escapes we've had we really have no cause for complaint. I only hope there will be no trouble with the authorities. Which reminds me, we'd better have a word with Roaring Wave about the casualties, so that when we tell our story his version of it will agree with ours. I don't think a single one of those Solomon Island boys got away. If there is a survivor, then he is hiding somewhere, and as far as I'm concerned he can stay there. But I should say that Roaring Wave's crowd killed the lot. Incidentally, we shall have to buy some handsome presents for Shell-Breaker and Full Moon. But for their pluck we shouldn't have got off as lightly as we have. We'll turn them lose in Lo Sing's store and let them help themselves.'
Ìf it hadn't been for Full Moon I shouldn't be here at all,' declared Ginger, looking over to where Full Moon and Shell-Breaker were recounting their adventures to an ejaculating circle of warriors.
Biggles waited until they had finished, and then called them over, when he made a short speech extolling their courage, and concluded by telling them that they could have whatever they liked from the store on Rutuona. `We lost the pearls,' he said finally, 'but that wasn't your fault.'
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Full Moon frowned as if she did not understand. `No lost pearls,' she said.
Sandy looked up quickly. 'What you say?' he demanded. Àtanelli, he take pearls on schooner.' He turned to Ginger. `You're quite sure about that, I suppose?' he went on quickly, with a new hope in his voice.
Àbsolutely certain,' answered Ginger. 'I sat next to him in the longboat when we went back to the schooner and he had the tin under his arm. I know the pearls were in it because I could hear them rattling. As soon as we got aboard he took the tin to his cabin—at least, when he came on deck again he hadn't got it, so obviously he must have left them below.'
Ànd it was immediately afterwards that you were thrown overboard and he sailed away—I think you -said?' questioned Biggles quickly.
`That's right.'
Ànd then Castanelli came back?'
`Yes.'
`Why did he come back?'
Ginger looked puzzled. He had wondered about that at the time, but in the rush of subsequent events the matter had passed from his mind. 'I don't know,' he said.
Àtanelli, he come back for pearls, I reckon,' put in Full Moon.
Sandy rose swifly to his feet. 'What do you know about pearl's?' he asked almost harshly.
Full Moon looked up into his face wonderingly. `Me take pearl,' she explained.
`You take pearl—how come?'
`Me on schooner,' explained Full Moon. 'I lie in sail. Soon hear plenty shouting on island; boys say Castanelli find pearl. Soon Atanelli he come aboard, bring pearl in tin. I watch along window in deck; see Atanelli put pearl in cabin. When he come up on deck I go through window, take pearl.'
`Where you put tin?' almost shouted Sandy, who was nearly beside himself with excitement.
`Me throw in lagoon.'
Sandy let out a yell. 'Did you hear that?' he cried. 'She threw them overboard. That's why Castanelli turned about and came back. He went down to the cabin and found 154
the pearls had gone. No wonder he came back. They're in the lagoon all the time.'
The others were all on their feet. Full Moon looked from one to the other in astonishment; it was clear that she found it difficult to understand why there should be so much fuss over a few pearls. But she grasped the situation. Àtanelli, he come back for pearl, I reckon,' she said again.
`But why didn't you tell me?' asked Ginger.
`No time,' explained Full Moon. 'You plenty dead, I think.'
`She means that when Castanelli threw you overboard - she forgot all about the pearls,'
said Biggles.
Àye. I reckon that's it,' agreed Sandy. 'We'll soon find out for certain.' He turned to Full Moon.
`What place you throw tin?' he demanded.
Ì show,' replied Full Moon without hesitation.
All was now bustle and excitement. Sandy yelled to Roaring Wave to man the canoe, and they were soon in it, steering according to Full Moon's directions. At the spot where the schooner had lain at anchor when Ginger had been a prisoner she raised her hand, and the canoe came to a stop. She then got over the side into, the water, with her face below the surface, looking first one way and then the other at the bed of the lagoon. Once she turned over again to breathe, paddled a little farther away, and went on with her search.
`What about the shark?' cried Ginger, aghast.
`Look around you,' replied Sandy. 'You needn't worry. If that mako shows up here he'll be a dead fish before he knows what's hit him.'
Ginger looked along the side of the canoe and saw a dozen men, muscles tense, hands on the hilts of -their knives, ready to dive into the water the instant danger threatened.
At last Full Moon swam back to the canoe and shook the water from her hair. 'Me see,'
she said quietly. For a minute or two she clung to the side of the canoe, breathing deeply, each breath longer than the preceding one. As she exhaled she bent her body like a jack-knife to force all the air from her lungs. Finally she took an extra deep breath, and turning head downwards, went down into the depths like an arrow.
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Gi
nger often thought about that moment afterwards, for it was the most dramatic he had ever known. The silent lagoon, the long black canoe with its grotesquely carved prow, and the line of grim, painted faces, with eyes boring into the depths, watching for the dangers they understood only too well. Every man was tense, the muscles rippling under his oiled brown skin.
Suddenly there was a slackening of the tension. Full Moon came into sight, shooting towards the surface, her blue pareu clinging to her lithe body. One arm was upraised. In it she held the tin. There was a roar from every man in the canoe as she broke the surface. For a little while she clung to the side of the boat drawing in her breath with that curious whistling sound which Ginger had come to know so well. Then she tossed the tin into the canoe and climbed in herself.
Sandy was on the tin in a flash, and dragged the lid off. `They're here!' he shouted hoarsely.
Biggles smiled. 'After this trip I shall be ready to believe anything,' he declared.
In a few minutes they were back on the beach, in an atmosphere very different from that of an hour previously. Full Moon was the heroine of the occasion—as indeed she deserved to be. Sandy held the pearl-tin under his arm, declaring that he would not lose sight of it again until the pearls were sold.
`Then let's get back to Rutuona for a start,' suggested Biggles. 'If we get along right away we can be back before dark. The machine is in no case to face another hurricane.'
So they took their places in the 'Scud', allowing Full Moon and Shell-Breaker to travel with them. In fact, much to her delight, Full Moon was permitted to sit next to Biggles in the control cabin and work the throttle. The war canoe was taken in tow, and under an azure sky the 'Scud', with her engines roaring, surged through the entrance to the lagoon for the last time.
A quarter of an hour later Ginger stood up and looked back. All he could see was a few tattered palm-fronds swinging in the breeze. Even as he watched they sank below the horizon, and in spite of its grim associations it gave him a feeling of sadness to think that he would never see the
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island again. 'I'm coming back here again one day,' he told Sandy confidently.
Sandy chuckled. 'That's what we all say,' he grinned. `The Islands get you that way.'
The End of the Trail
The return of the warriors to Rutuona with Full Moon, and the story of how Castanelli had died, created a sensation which, Roaring Wave declared, demanded a feast to celebrate it, and preparations were begun forthwith. The white men were the guests of honour, and in the glare of many torches the banquet began. Ginger, seated on a mat between Full Moon and Shell-Breaker, was ready for it, for it was a long time since he had eaten anything substantial. Leaf plates were provided, and Ginger's was heaped in turn with pork and popoe,' sweet potatoes, shark's sweetbreads, and other local delicacies, to say nothing of unlimited quantities of fruits of many sorts. Every time he paused in eating Full Moon or Shell-Breaker would shout, Wail Kai!', and push more food towards him. Apart from that there was very little talking, for in Polynesia a meal is something to be taken seriously.
When all had eaten to repletion the guests reclined on their mats, while the children rushed out to eat what was left over, as was their privilege. Then, in the orange light of the flickering torches, the warriors began to recount their version of the end of the Avarata. Ginger did not hear the finish. Worn out, he retired from the scene, and, flopping down on the floor of their hut, was instantly asleep.
It was broad daylight when he awoke, to find that the others had been at work on the machine for several hours, and the job of mending the broken wing nearly complete. By noon they were ready to depart. When they walked down to the beach with their belongings they found all the people of the island gathered there—men, women, and children sitting on the sand. As the white men approached they began singing their moving song of farewell:
Popoe is the staple article of food in the Marquesas. It is a sticky yellow paste manufactured from the fruit of the breadfruit-tree.
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`Farewell to you,
You go to a far-distant land.
There you will stay, and you will weep for me. Ever I shall be here, and my tears will fall like rain. The time has come. Farewell.'
Many of the singers were sobbing. Full Moon and Shell-Breaker, dressed in the flimsy finery they had selected at Biggles's invitation from Lo Sing's store, sat apart from the others, weeping unrestrainedly, their pareus lifted to their. eyes. Their distress was so affecting that it was all Ginger could do to keep his own tears back. He ran over to them and held their hands.
`Kaoha, my friends,' he whispered huskily. 'I shall not forget you. One day I shall come back.'
They clung to him, imploring him to stay, but the others were calling, and in the end he had to tear himself away. With his eyes misty with tears he ran down the beach and splashed out to the machine. The engines were started. The cabin door slammed. The engines roared and the 'Scud' carved a trail of foam across the bay for the last time. As it rose into the air Ginger sat silent at a side window, his heart heavy with grief, taking his last view of Rutuona.
Sandy clapped him on the shoulder. 'Don't worry,' he said. 'You'll come back. Once you have been to the Islands you can't forget them, and one day they will call you back.'
There is little more to tell. The 'Scud's' first landfall was Tahiti, where Sandy, who knew the Governor well, made a full report on the loss of the Avaruta, and the death of her captain. The others confirmed his statements, which were accepted without question.
Indeed, the Governor hinted that in his opinion Castanelli was well out of the way, for his illegal practices, including the selling of liquor to the natives, had been known for some time, but it had been difficult to obtain evidence to convict him. Several leading Parisian pearl-buyers were in Papeete, and to them Sandy sold most of the pearls, retaining only the very largest, for which he thought Biggles would get a better price in Paris. Nevertheless, those sold on the island not only paid for the entire expedition but left an ample margin for division among the partners.
Sandy remained in Tahiti, announcing that he was going
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to buy a schooner and set up as a trader; but the others suspected that the lure of pearls would be too great for him, and it was far more likely that he would fit out his schooner for another raid on the pearl-bed.
By the time they reached Australia the machine was too badly in need of a complete overhaul for them to consider flying home in it, so Biggles sold it for what it was worth to an operating company and out of the proceeds bought three tickets for air travel to England.
Ìt will be a change to sit still and let somebody else do the work,' he remarked with a smile, as they all went aboard.
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21 Biggles In the South Seas Page 17
