CHAPTER XXIV
Dan walked home. He had to have physical action. It was close to midnight when he let himself into his house, but there was a dim light burning in the living room and Dan turned in here, cast his hat and coat on top of the piano and rang savagely for Sooey Wan, who, having just returned from his nightly pilgrimage to Chinatown, answered on the jump. At sight of Dan’s pale, tortured face the old Chinaman turned and fled to the kitchen. He returned presently bearing a siphon bottle, some ice, a bottle of Scotch whisky and—two glasses. Silently he mixed two highballs, handed one to Dan, took the other himself, sat down and said in a voice of compelling gentleness:
“Missa Dan, you tellum ol’ Sooey Wan. Wha’s mallah, boy?”
Dan cooled his parched throat with the highball. Indeed, he had rung for the Chinaman for the very purpose of ordering one. Strange, he thought, how Sooey Wan could understand him without a blueprint and directions for using!
“Sooey Wan, I’m all through. I have gone broke.”
“All the way?” Sooey Wan’s voice cooed like a flute.
“All the way and back, Sooey Wan. I’m done. You’ll have to leave me now and go back to China. I cannot afford to pay your wages any more.”
“To hell with wages!” Sooey Wan, for the first time in his life, was genuinely angry, disgusted and humiliated. His eyes showed it, his wrinkled lower lip twisted and revealed his yellow fangs, his voice reeked with the very soul of profanity as he rasped out a few words in Chinese. Then: “Big fool, wha’ for you talkum money to Sooey Wan?”
“You know very well I didn’t mean to offend you, you old idol,” Dan protested. “I spoke the truth. I am broke, utterly smashed.”
“Shut up!” screeched Sooey Wan. “Wha’ for you all time tellum lie?” He set down untasted the highball he had planned to drink in profound sympathy with his adored boss and left the room.
“Sooey Wan, come back here!” Dan ordered.
Sooey Wan’s voice rose in a shriek like the bull fiddle of his native land. “Shut up! Shut up! You klazy fool, wha’s mallah you? You no bloke. You bet. No can do.”
Dan sighed and sipped his highball. At the same moment Tamea slid out from under a dark afghan on a divan in the far corner of the room. She had fallen asleep there and, unknown to Sooey Wan and Dan, had been listening to their conversation. Swiftly she crossed the room to him now; as he rose to greet her she put her arms around his neck and drew his head down until his cheek caressed hers. Thus she held him a long time, in silence, save for the plainly discernible, regular beat of her heart. Then:
“Poor boy! You are hurt? But yes, I know it.”
He nodded. “Smashed,” he murmured. “All my money gone. Ruined.”
Tamea’s glance went past his ear and rested on Sooey Wan standing in the doorway, a large red lacquered box in his arms. She shook her head at him ever so slightly and like a yellow wraith he faded back into the hall.
“Ruined?” Tamea queried. “Has my lord, then, parted with his honor?”
“No, no, not that,” he cried brokenly. “Nobody will think that of me. I will pay, but it will take all I have to do it, and when they have finished with me I shall have nothing left wherewith to make a new start. But never mind, Tamea. I’m not whipped. Just dazed, not down for the count. I’ll come back.”
He could feel the little chuckle of mirth that rippled through the lithe body pressed so close against him. “So?” she declared with her golden little laugh, “it is only a matter of money. And yet my lord is shaken like a coco-palm in the monsoon. Silly, silly white man. He does not know that I have money and that all of it is his.” She drew his head around and kissed him on the lips; he trembled with the knowledge of her tremendous sweetness. “You will take my money and let me see you smile again, Dan Pritchard,” she commanded.
“No, no, darling. I couldn’t do that—ever. Please do not ask me to.”
“But why, dear one?”
“Then indeed would I be parting with my honor.”
“What madness! Is it because I am not your wife? Well, we will be married quickly and then——”
“No,” he protested. “I tell you it is impossible. I’ll never be able to repay the debt of your asking me to take your money, but—I shall never, never take one penny of it. I couldn’t.”
“But after we are married——”
“Never. I am your guardian. Your father gave you to me because he had faith in my manhood, he believed me to be a gentleman. You will not understand because your love blinds you, Tamea, but the white men of my world have a code and we must never break it.”
“Oh,” said Tamea softly, and her eyes filled with tears. “Of what use is money save to buy happiness? When a man takes a woman to wife does he not take all she has—all of her love, all of her wealth, all of her faith? Is she not to be the mother of his children? You are right, dear one. I could never understand your white man’s code.”
“Some day you will, honey. Kiss me good night and run along to your room, child. I am unhappy tonight and when I am unhappy I have a desire to be alone. I wish to think.”
She kissed him and went upstairs obediently; as she paused on the first landing and gazed down into the hall she saw Sooey Wan slide noiselessly into the living room, his red lacquered box still clasped under his arm. Tamea stood there, wondering—and then to her ears came distinctly the sound of money clinking merrily.
Tamea came back downstairs and peered around the jamb of the door into the living room. Sooey Wan was on his knees beside the red lacquered box, with both hands tossing out on the carpet hundreds of gold pieces, bales of yellow-backed bills and large, fat, heavy Manila envelopes.
“You count ’em, Missa Dan,” he begged when the box was empty. And Dan Pritchard, wondering, knelt beside Sooey Wan and counted long and in silence, making many notations on a piece of paper. And Tamea, watching, presently was aware that Sooey Wan, who trusted not in banks, had, in his forty-odd years in the United States, accumulated in that red lacquered box a fortune of two hundred and nineteen thousand, four hundred and nine dollars and eighty cents in cash and bonds.
“Sooey Wan,” said Dan Pritchard, “do you cook for me by day and rob people by night?”
Sooey Wan cackled merrily. “Oh, your papa always pay me big money—hund’ed, hund’ed fifty dolla month and Sooey Wan no spend velly much. But Sooey Wan play poker velly nice, velly lucky fan tan and pi gow, and bimeby I ketchum one cousin. Cousin no money hab got, but him know all about raisee vegetable. You know, Missa Dan, ketchum farm up on Saclamento Liver. So Sooey Wan makee partner with cousin and raisee early spud, ketchum more land. Velly easy. Boss, you likee Sooey Wan sellee lanch on Saclamento Liver, can do. Sure. Sellee that land plenty quick, ketchum thousand dollar for one acre, have got thlee hund’ed acre. You likee, Missa Dan, I sell for you. Sooey Wan no ketchum son, no ketchum wifee, no ketchum papa, no ketchum mama, no ketchum nobody but Missa Dan. Missa Dan allee same Sooey Wan’s boy. Eh? My boy losee money, Sooey Wan no loosum. Long time ago Sooey Wan talkee your father. Your father say: ‘Sooey, my partner, Missa Casson, no good. Heap damn fool.’ All light, I watchum.” He came close to Dan and rested his yellow old claw of a hand on the beloved shoulder. “Boy,” he said, “Sooey Wan savum all for you. You takee, you look out for Sooey Wan, givee little money for play China lottery, givee room, givee job, that’s all light. Sooey Wan likee this house. Likee live here, likee die here, then you send Sooey Wan back to China, keepee land on Saclamento Liver, keepee money, mally lady queen and have many son. I think that plenty good for my boy. Sooey Wan velly old man,” he continued pleadingly. “No can live all time. Sure you takee, boy. Then you play lone hand in office. Old man Casson no damn good.” He shrugged optimistically. “Bimeby you ketchum all your money back.”
Dan Pritchard thrust out his long arms and his fingers closed around Sooey Wan’s neck. “No,” he said, “I’m not broke. I never was broke, and I never will be broke while you and Tamea live. Thank God for you both! I couldn’t take her money, Sooey Wan, but I will take yours—later, when I need it. I’ll make you a partner in my reorganized business.” His fingers tightened around the old servant’s throat. “You old yellow devil!” he said and shook Sooey Wan vigorously. “We understand each other, I think. God bless you and bring you to some sort of Oriental heaven, you golden-hearted old heathen.”
Sooey Wan took up his untasted highball. “Hullah for hell!” he cackled, tossed off the drink, gathered up his fortune and departed for his room, chuckling like a malevolent old gnome.
Dan Pritchard sat down, alone in the living room, and wept. He was a bit of a sentimentalist. About one o’clock in the morning he went up to bed.
At two o’clock Sooey Wan was awakened by a rapping at his door. He crawled out of bed, opened the door an inch and found Tamea outside.
“Wha’s mallah?” he growled.
“Sooey Wan, please lend me five hundred dollars—now,” Tamea pleaded. “Dan Pritchard will pay you back.”
“Wha’ for you want money now?” Sooey Wan demanded suspiciously.
“You are a servant,” Tamea reminded him. “You should not ask questions. If you do not desire to oblige me I will make Dan Pritchard send you away from this house.”
Sooey Wan wilted, dug around in his red lacquered box and handed Tamea five hundred dollars. Then he went back to bed to think it over. As for Tamea, ten minutes later she let herself out the front door very quietly. She carried her accordion and a small suitcase which she had appropriated from Julia.
A taxicab cruised down Pacific Avenue after having deposited a bibulous gentleman in the arms of a sleepy butler. With an eye single to business the driver pulled over to the curb and hailed Tamea.
“Ride, Miss?”
“Take me to the place where the ships may be found,” she ordered and climbed in. At Clay Street wharf, just north of the ferry building, she got out and walked along the waterside, north. At that hour the Embarcadero was deserted, save for an occasional watchman at a dock head, and to their curious glances Tamea paid no heed. She stumbled blindly on, questing like a homecoming lost dog, and presently she found that which she sought. It was the unmistakable odor of copra and it brought Tamea to a little hundred and thirty foot trading schooner that lay chafing her blistered sides against the bulkhead at the foot of Pacific Street. Uninvited, Tamea stepped aboard, sat down on the hatch coaming and waited for dawn. With the dawn came a gasoline tug and bumped alongside the schooner. Then men came on deck and to them Tamea spoke in a language they could understand. The master came, stood before her and gazed upon her curiously.
“Who are you, young lady?” he said presently, “and what do you want?”
“I am the daughter of Gaston Larrieau, master of the schooner Moorea. My father is dead. My name is Tamea and I am weary of this white man’s land. My heart aches for my own people and I would go back to them. I have money to pay for my passage. I would go to Riva.”
“I have no passenger license, child, but your father was my friend. If you can stand us, we can stand you. There will be no charge for the passage. We are towing out this morning with the tide and our first port of call is Tahiti. Go below, girl, and the cook will give you breakfast.”
As the sun was rising back of Mount Diablo the launch cast the little schooner adrift off the Golden Gate and the Kanaka sailors, chanting a hymn, ran up her headsails. As they filled, Tamea came out of the cabin and looked again upon that ocher-tinted coastline, watched again the bizarre painted gasoline trawlers of the Mediterranean fishermen put out for the Cordelia banks. Then the mainsail went up and the schooner heeled gently over, took a bone in her teeth and headed south.
“It is best to leave him thus,” the girl murmured. “He does not love me and he never will. I would not stay to afflict him. What he would not accept from me he accepted from a servant. Then I knew!”
She lifted her golden voice and sang “Aloha,” the Hawaiian song of farewell. . . .
For Tamea, Queen of Riva, was of royal blood, and when the gods rained blows upon her she could take them smiling!