But when days and days passed away, and there were no more signs of earth-tremor, she regained courage, and was once more the same happy girl she had been before.
Then the occurrence took place that made Reginald suspicious of the honesty of some of those British sailors.
One morning Harry was missing. They sought him high, they sought him low, but all in vain. Then it occurred to Johnson to look into his box. The box, with all his gold and pearls, was gone!
Harry’s box had been left open, and it was found to be empty. No one else had lost anything. However, this was a clue, and the officers set themselves to unravel the mystery at once. Nor was it long before they did so. Not only was one of the largest canoes missing, with a sail that had been rigged on her, but two of the strongest natives and best boatmen.
It was sadly evident that Harry was a thief, and that he had bribed these two savages to set out to sea with him.
There was a favouring breeze for the west, and Harry no doubt hoped that, after probably a week’s sailing, he would reach some of the more civilised of the Polynesian islands, and find his way in a ship back to Britain. Whether he did so may never be known, but the fact that the breeze increased to over half a gale about three days after he had fled, makes it rather more than probable that the big canoe was swamped, and that she foundered, going down with the crew and the ill-gotten gold as well. Only a proof that the wicked do not always prosper in this world.
Poor Johnson’s grief was sad to witness.
“On my little store,” he told his messmates, wringing his hands, and with the tears flowing over his cheeks, “I placed all my future happiness. I care not now what happens. One thing alone I know: life to me has no more charms, and I can never face poor Mary again.”
He went to the diggings again in a halfhearted kind of way, and for a day or two was fairly successful; but it was evident that his heart was almost broken, and that if something were not done he might some evening throw himself over a cliff, and so end a life that had become distasteful to him.