SERGEANT BARIGI
I looked at my men. “Well, shall we take Bogege? You have heard the tale; he may have fifty or he may have a hundred men with him, and we can’t find out until we are amongst them.” They looked at one another, then they looked at me; then Corporal Barigi said, “It is for you to say.” “Yes, you mutton head,” I snapped at him, “but what do you think?” “I don’t think,” he answered. “You say we are to try and take Bogege; all right, we try; you say Bogege too strong; all right, we go to Cape Nelson.” At last I decided that the chance of catching the old scorpion was too good to lose, and told the police we would make the attempt; clearly they thought we were taking on the devil of a tall order, but even so, the prospect of an uncommonly good scrap pleased them. The men prisoners were then taken into our council; their villages had frequently been raided by our quarry, and they both hated and feared him. My plan was to approach the island at about an hour before dawn, find out by the fires on which side the natives were encamped, and then sneak up on the other side. The police and I would land with handcuffs, while the prisoners looked after the boat; if anything happened to us, they were to bolt at once for Cape Nelson, and there tell the constabulary what had occurred.
We sneaked up to the island in the dark, feeling our way on a falling tide, over the deep patches and channels of a wide coral reef. Then the four of us crept slowly across the island, until we found ourselves in a large camp of mostly sleeping natives; to locate Bogege was the work of a moment, while the camp awoke with a clamour. Agara and I got up to him. “Up with your hands, Bogege! The Government has come for you!” said Agara. Bogege saw the uniforms and rifles, and promptly surrendered, with the sole remark, “Those lying Winiapi told me that ‘The Man’ had gone to Samarai.” (“The Man,” by the way, was my name amongst the natives.) We got five other offenders as well, Agara yelling all the time to the natives, that they were covered by the rifles of the police hidden in the scrub. Then we marched our handcuffed gang back to the whaleboat, and dumped them in, just as the remaining natives discovered our weakness and the bluff we had put up, and flew for their spears.
The whaleboat was now so far aground that, with her increased load, we could not hope to get her off before dawn, which was fast approaching. Hastily pulling out my revolver, I handed it to Mrs. Agara, ordering Agara to tell Bogege and his fellow prisoners that Mrs. Agara would shoot them, and the Cape Vogel prisoners knock out their brains with tomahawks, if they attempted to escape or take part in the coming fight. As they were all linked together with handcuffs, they were fairly helpless.
The three police and I went ashore again, and took cover between the boat and the now thoroughly incensed natives; a scrappy, desultory fight then took place, lasting until daylight. Neither side could see the other; the scrub, the dark and general uncanniness of the thing, confused the natives and prevented them from charging. Spears thrown at random, or at our rifle flashes, rattled amongst us and the stones and bushes in which we were sheltering; whilst every now and then a yelp or a falling body told that some of our shots were taking effect. As soon as dawn broke the natives drew off a little; whereupon we rushed our whaler out a couple of hundred yards over the reef, Bogege and his fellows being made to wade and haul with the rest. We then hastily pulled round the island to where Bogege’s camp was situated; here, standing off in deep water, at about a hundred yards’ range, the police made such practice that, in a few minutes, the now thoroughly demoralized natives bolted across the island. Covered by our rifles, our two Cape Vogel prisoners then landed, and chopped holes with tomahawks in the bottoms of about a dozen large canoes. Then, very pleased indeed with ourselves, we hurried home as fast as sail and paddle could drive us to Cape Nelson; the two Cape Vogel prisoners had taken some paddles from Bogege’s canoes, so he and his friends had the pleasure of speeding their way to gaol with their own paddles.
On the way back, Agara thought he would take advantage of my pleased mood to broach the subject of his wife remaining permanently on the strength at the Station. “My wife was very useful last night,” he began, “she is a very clever, hard-working woman; she can wash clothes better than any of the wives of the police at the Station, white clothes and tablecloths and things like that. Mrs. Tomlinson taught her at the Mission.” “It must be very pleasant for you to have a wife like that,” I remarked, apparently not rising to the occasion. “Yes, sir! Yes, sir! But I thought perhaps you might like her to remain with me at the Station to wash your clothes.” “Yes, Agara, but you know ‘ten bobbers’ are not allowed on the strength.” (“Ten bobbers” are first year’s men at 10s. a month.) Agara’s face fell as he repeated this to his wife, who had been hopefully watching us, and trying to follow the conversation; great tears rolled down that lady’s face and fell splash on the gunwale. “Tell your wife, Agara, that if she howls now, I’ll put her with the sergeant’s wife, and you in barracks.” Agara, snuffling slightly himself, told her; whereupon she scandalized every one by hurling herself into the bottom of the boat and howling dismally. “Corporal, will you kindly tell this husband of a contumacious and mutinous wife, that though ‘ten bobbers’ are not allowed wives, full privates are; and that after last night he is a full private at a pound.” Mrs. Agara dried her tears, while Agara showed his gratitude by quite unnecessarily assisting my orderly to clean my belts and arms.
A few days after my return to the Station, a large number of Maisina canoes appeared and landed some minor chiefs, by whom I was informed that the Maisina desired to make peace with the Government, and would consent to the appointment of a village constable; they brought with them the son of a late very prominent chief as a candidate for the office. The man was given the appointment, and subsequently I had little trouble with that people; individual crime, of course, took place, but organized collective communal crime, such as raiding and plundering, became a thing of the past, and the coastal people enjoyed a security previously undreamt of by them.
Bogege and his friends were sentenced to six months’ imprisonment; after which, as he then saw the error of his ways, I made him also a village constable.