"Quite happy, Jean?" asked Blair
"Happy, dear? Could any one possibly be happier? Look at that!"—Master Kenni-Kenni rolling gleefully on a white spread at her feet in a state of nudity, and gurgling paroxysms of happiness.
"He's a fine little fellow"—and he poked his son playfully in his fat little stomach, provoking fat-creased laughter and dimples and more gurgles.
"He's the finest little fellow in the whole world, and he's yours and mine, Ken. God has been very good to us, dear. I sometimes feel as if we had no right to be quite so happy while——"
"While?"
"One can't help thinking of the poor little souls in the slums and alleys at home. It really doesn't seem right, somehow. If we could only bring them all out here——"
"I wish it were possible, but it isn't. Meanwhile, this is our chosen work, and by God's grace it seems like to prosper. I am very grateful that you are content here, dear. After London——"
"London! I'd give the whole of London for one curl of Kenni-Kenni's hair. Isn't it beautiful? There never was any silk like it in this world."
"Never!" said Blair with conviction.
Then Alison Evans and Mary Stuart came across to them, Mary carrying Alivani.
"We have come to worship too," said Alison. "I wish you'd order Mary to give me my baby, Mr. Blair. I can hardly get touching her when she's about."
"Well, Jean won't let me have hers," laughed Mary in self-defence.
"Jean was just valuing the whole of London Town against one curl of that young man's hair. So you see what the whole of him's worth, Mary. Oh yes, you may touch him, if you'll promise not to spoil a hair of his head."
Mary laid Alivani down on the white spread by Kenni-Kenni, and the two gurgled and kicked in company, while she knelt over them with absorbed face and happy lights in her eyes.
"Jean was wishing she could bring all the poor children in London to kick on the beach here," said Blair.
"Yes. I often think how very much better off the children here are," said Alison Evans.
"In some respects."
"In all respects, I'm inclined to think. Their fathers and mothers almost worship them. Cruelty to children is unheard of. Bodily they are miles ahead——"
"And morally and spiritually?" he said, to draw her on.
"I have seen children at home, in Glasgow and Edinburgh, almost as benighted as these, and not half so pleasant to deal with. Now, with the chances we are giving them, I think these are infinitely the better off."
"Under the new order of things, perhaps. But hitherto you must remember that death dodged life round every corner here, and life broke off very short at times. However, we cannot clean up all the world; but, please God, we'll do our best with this little bit of it. And now," jumping up, "I must get back to work, or your masters will be calling me names. Don't kill those two infants with kindness, Mary."
He stood looking down upon them all for a moment, while the women all bent over the wrigglers on the white cloth.
"Is it possible that not one of you ever feels a longing for the fleshpots of Egypt?" he asked, with a smile.
"Do we ever show any symptoms?" asked Jean.
"You certainly do at the moment. You all three look as if you would like to devour those children on the spot," and he went away to grind out dialects with Matti and Ha'o.
CHAPTER XXVII
PEACE WITH A SPEAR
The work progressed favourably but not without occasional set-backs. On Kapaa'a, where its supervision was most constant, the advance was naturally greatest. On the outer islands the brown men and women were effusive in their promises—in expectation of largesse. Like the prodigals of all time, they were always ready to discount future benefits—which they did not very fully understand and considered somewhat problematic—for a trifle on account, which they understood extremely well. But the moment their preceptors' backs were turned, the promises were forgotten in immediate enjoyment of the reward.
All this was only what was to be expected, and in no way disconcerted the labourers in the field. Blair would rate the delinquents good-humouredly for their shortcomings, and they would acknowledge them like schoolboys, promise amendment, and break the promise before the Torch had rounded the Head. He felt himself in closer touch with them, however, on each visit, and was satisfied. His plans and hopes were very wide-reaching, and God's temples, natural, physical, or spiritual, do not rise in a day.
Occasionally there were more serious lapses, and these had to be dealt with firmly but delicately, so thin were the cords by which he held them.
Aia, the smallest island of the group, lay a short five miles beyond Kanele, sacred to the memory of Aunt Jannet Harvey. Aia had a population of about fifty. Kanele three times as many.
Blair and Jean and Kenni-Kenni landed on the latter one day, on one of the regular rounds of visitation, and received the usual expectant welcome from old Maru and Kahili and the rest. The women crowded enthusiastically round Jean and her boy, while Blair talked to the men and divided among them the things he had brought. They stopped on shore several hours and were regaled with fruits and coco-nuts. When they got into the boat the whole population lined the beach and waved them farewells.
"We really seem to be getting hold of them at last," said Blair, as they rolled along towards the Torch.
"They are very friendly and seem very glad to see us," said Jean, and they went on to Aia.
"Something wrong," said Captain Cathie, as the Torch drew in.
The village was not in its usual place. There were no people about.
They landed cautiously, Blair and Cathie and half a dozen men, and found the houses in ruins. With added caution they climbed the hill, and in time came upon the villagers lurking in holes and crannies.
Their story was simple. The very day after the Torch's last visit, the men of Kanele, headed by Maru and young Kahili, had come over in their canoes and demanded the goods they had received from the white men. These being refused, they proceeded to take them by force. The Aia men were outnumbered and beaten, their village burned, and several of them killed—and eaten. The rest had lived in the fear of death ever since.
Blair was a man of wrath that day. His first feeling was the same as Captain Cathie's, in whom the natural man always ran strong.
"Well, captain, what do you advise?" he asked.
"I'd like to give those Kanele men a right good skelping," said Cathie warmly. "Something they wouldn't forget in a hurry."
"So would I, but I'm not sure of the wisdom of it."
"Truckling beggars! Sweet as milk when we're there, and playing the devil the minute our back's turned. They need a lesson."
"We'll take the night over it. It's a serious matter."
They walked the deck far into the night, with the big stars swimming in the smooth black rollers, and the distant roar of the Aia surges, now to port and now to starboard, as they beat gently to and fro in default of anchorage.
"In the first place," said Blair, summing up their ideas, "these people are not safe here. Whatever we do or don't do, the Kanele men will take it out of them as soon as we're gone. We must do our best to persuade them to migrate to Kapaa'a. That will be a good thing for them and a good thing for us. As to the Kanele men, the difficulty is that we want to retain our hold on them. This affair only shows how great the need is. And if we take measures against them—any measures almost—we are like to weaken the small hold we have now."
"All the same," said Cathie bluntly, "it won't do to let 'em think they can carry on like this and nothing said about it. That'd be fair provoking them to do the same again."
"It's difficult to know just what to do," said Blair; and Jean down below, with Kenni-Kenni nestling close in her arms, heard the four feet tramping, tramping, slowly and heavily, to and fro, till she fell asleep. They seemed to be still tramping whenever the Torch gave a sudden kick and woke her. But there was a sense of guardianship in the very sound, and Kenni-Kenni's soft head against her heart was very comforting.
In the morning they set to work on the plans they had arrived at overnight.
Blair went ashore early, while Cathie prepared for his passengers.
It did not need five minutes' talk to show the Aia men how unsafe their position was. It was self-evident. But it took much talk and persuasion to induce them to migrate to Kapaa'a.
They saw the advantages. Some of them had been there already and seen for themselves; but the brown men cling to their own bits of coral or volcanic rock as strenuously as Highland crofter to his dripping heather, or Irish peasant to his patch of bog.
The women, however, had listened to those marvellous accounts of the unheard-of security of life and property on Kapaa'a, and now they joined forces with Blair and carried the day. By sunset they were all aboard the Torch with such belongings as the Kanele men had left them. The Torch beat to and fro again throughout the night, and not a native closed an eye for the strangeness of it all, and in the early morning Blair was ashore again on Kanele. He had assured Jean there was no danger; but he left Captain Cathie behind—to look after the crowd of brown men and women.
He walked boldly up to old Maru's house, and found it still asleep.
The old man started up wide awake at his call, and the look on his face was a matrix of Blair's—detected wrong quailing before righteous wrath.
"You know what I have come about, Maru," said Blair. "You have done ill by Aia. Why?"
"It was the young men. They desired more goods."
"Call the young men. I will speak to them."
But there was no need to call them. They had seen the Torch and were coming, and coming in expectation of possible trouble, for they all came armed.
"Yes, I see you know why I have come back," said Blair, as they thronged about the house. "You have done wrong, and you have got to answer for it. We came here to make life brighter by bringing peace——"
"We don't want peace. Fighting is very much better," growled one.
"Oh, you are brave men! How many men were there on Aia? Twenty-five at most. And how many of you went over? More than sixty. Oh yes, you like fighting when the others are weak. How will you like it when you are beaten and running for your lives into the hills? You have done ill, and you must answer for it. Maru and Kahili will come with me to Kapaa'a, and we will decide what shall be done."
"Not me!" said old Maru, or words to that effect, and drew from its hiding-place one of the axes Blair had given him, and began to swing it gently in his hand.
"If you do not come, we shall fetch you. It is for you to say. If we have to fetch you, it will make trouble."
Old Maru's axe swung gently to and fro, to and fro, as though hungering to bite, but doubtful.
"That would not serve you, Maru," said Blair quietly. "Though you cut me in pieces, the rest would come and you would suffer the more. The old times are past. We have come to give you better times. Peace you shall have, though we have to bring it with club and spear."
And just then Long Tom on the yacht bellowed his tremendous note, and the brown men looked round apprehensively.
"That is my big canoe speaking," said Blair. "But it is only a warning. It can strike as hard as it talks. Will you save trouble by coming, Maru?"
"I will not go."
"Then we shall come for you. I am sorry; but the wrong-doing is yours.... Let no man lift his hand, or worse will follow," he said, as a restless movement rustled among them. Then eyeing them steadily, he passed through, not sure at what moment axe or club might fall on his head. But so high was his look that no man, even of those he had passed, found courage for the blow, and he walked down to the beach alone.
"I'm mighty glad to see you back whole," said Cathie, as Blair swung up on deck. "I saw their clubs through the glass, and I misdoubted them. They wouldn't come?"
"No, they wouldn't come, so I promised to fetch them. Now we'll get on, captain. First to land our passengers on Kapaa'a, and then as we decided last night."
Ha'o and the rest were mightily surprised at the size of the Torch's company. But the chief jumped to Blair's views at once.
"You will soon become a nation at this rate, Ha'o."
"I will deal well with them," said Ha'o.
"And now as to the men of Kanele?"
"We will make an end of them."
"I want them as part of your nation, and dead men are no use. If we go in force enough, I do not think they will fight. But they have broken the peace, and they must have a lesson."
"We will teach them with the spear. It will be a lesson for the others also. When shall we start?"
"The sooner the better; but first we must see the newcomers housed."
That took two days, and then the Torch and the Jean Arnot sailed with larger crews than they were in the habit of carrying. First round the other islands, at each of which Blair and Ha'o landed and had a talk with the headmen and explained their ideas to them.
And much hard talking it took, in some cases, to carry their views. But they were set on it, and they prevailed.
From each village they enlisted the headman and certain of his followers, from six to ten, according to the population, and in due course came down on Kanele one hundred and fifty brown men and eighteen whites, with Long Tom in reserve, and great hopes that so large a display would suffice without any fighting.
All the boats on Kapaa'a had been requisitioned for the debarkation, and it was an imposing flotilla that drew in to Kanele beach that day to bring peace at the point of the spear. And, composed, as the gathering was, of the most discordant elements, it was yet all moulded to one purpose by the strong will of one man, and by the very differences that separated its units one from another. For each component felt itself but a part of the whole, and in a minority which left it no option but to work with the rest.
Not a soul was to be seen on shore, but they knew that black eyes watched stealthily from every cover.
"Maru! Kahili! We have come for you," shouted Blair. "Here are Ha'o of Kapaa'a, and Ruel of Anape——" and he recited all the names of the head-men. "We will give you till the shadows are smallest to come in. Then be it on your own heads!" and the great company sat down on the beach to pass the time.
"Will they come?" asked Blair of Ha'o.
"They will come," said Ha'o. "They would have no chance against us, and they are not fools."
Blair seized the opportunity for more talk with the leading men from the other islands. He showed them that none were safe if raiding were permitted, not even the strongest, for against the strongest combination might prevail. The only security was in union against illdoers; and he rubbed that lesson into them till they were not likely to forget it.
Before the wheeling shadows had shortened the slim black lines of the palms into their spreading crowns, a tumult broke out inland, and as they all stood expectant, a mob, in which were many women, came hurrying along, with old Maru and Kahili on its front like corks on a swelling tide.
"It is well," said Blair, as he went to meet them. "You have given us much trouble, but you have saved yourselves more. Do you understand, Maru, and you, Kahili, and all you men and women of Kanele, what this great company means? It means that the old times are gone for ever, and that the better times are come. If there is to be any fighting in future, we of Kapaa'a and the islands round about will have our say in the matter. Take those two to the boats," and at a sign from him a file of Torches led the prisoners away. "There are others among you who prefer war to peace," he said. "I want them also."
This caused a hubbub amongst them, and much hot discussion, but at last certain ones were evolved from the crowd, and pushed to the front protesting, and to the number of ten he had them marched down to the boats, amid the wailing of their women.
"Now, listen!" cried Blair, waving down their cries with a peremptory hand. "Is it to be peace or war henceforth?"
"Peace," wailed the women, and the men stood silent. "Then let the women bring here all the spears and clubs, for you will not need them."
This was touching them on the raw, for the brown man's weapons are his dearest possessions.
But this was to be a lesson once and for all, and not for the men of Kanele only.
"I must have them," said Blair. "If you will not bring them, we must get them ourselves. Which shall it be?"
The men stood, stubborn and sulky. Some of the women on the outskirts of the crowd began to trickle away.
Then old Maru's wife crept up downcastly from the side of the throng, carrying two long spears and a club, and cast them on the sand at Blair's feet.
"It is good, Maruaine," he said gently.
"You will not kill our men, Missi?" she asked piteously.
"I have come to make your lives happier, Maruaine. I will not hurt a hair of their heads. But they must learn, and this is the first lesson."
Kahili's wife followed, and one by one the other women came, with more spears and clubs, till the pile was a goodly one.
Then he had a fire kindled beneath them, and the brown men watched its easy lighting with a match with wonder, but twisted uneasily as the weapons were consumed.
