Now Kearney had old-fashioned ideas as to how young people should behave towards their elders, and Dick had received many a “clip” from him for disobedience. He was starting to “go after” the girl, when he saw two hands go up to her head; she was arranging her hair. One might have fancied her before a mirror.
This sight checked him. He finished his work, put the line away, and retired to the house. During their ten years of residence the house had almost been destroyed by a big blow from the northwest and Kearney, in rebuilding, had enlarged it.
There was plenty of room for him and Dick, and to-night, as he lay there, the four ships on their shelves above him and Dick sound asleep by the wall, he could see through the open doorway a new picture: the mat sail of the canoe still unfurled, and, just distinguishable in the fast-rising twilight, the head of the girl above the bank.
Kearney was worried. Living in ease and quietude, one might fancy worry his last visitant, but that was not so; quite small things, things he would never have given a second thought to on shipboard, had the power to upset him here, and though he would not have changed his mode of life for worlds, a broken fishing line or a leak in the dinghy would make him grumpy for hours, cursing his fate and wondering what was going to happen next.
Katafa was worrying him now; she was unlike any Kanaka he had ever seen. Where had she come from? Was it from that island he guessed to be lying down south there? And if so, might she not bring others of her kind after her? Then the way she had slipped from under his hand, and those eyes of hers which she kept fixed on him—she wasn’t right.
He dropped off to sleep with this conviction in his mind and dreamt troublous dreams, awaking about two in the morning to wonder what she was doing and whether everything was secure. Then, sleep driven away, he came out into the windless, starry night, where a six days’ old moon was lolling above the trees.
Away out to sea a red flicker met his gaze. A fire was burning on the reef. Trumpets blowing in the night could not have astonished him more.
He watched for a moment as the flame waxed and waned, now casting a trail of red light on the lagoon water, now dying down only to leap up again. Then he came running to the canoe. The girl was not there and the dinghy was gone; the paddle was gone from the canoe also; she must have taken it to paddle herself over to the reef, not being able to use the sculls.
There was plenty of dried weed and bits of wreckage on the reef to make a fire with, but how had she got a light? He came back to the house and searched for the box of matches on the little shelf outside, where it was always put when done with. It was gone.
She must have come “smelling round” when they were asleep. She must have noticed where the matches had been put and treasured up the fact in her dark mind!