“I'll be all right in half an hour,” he said weakly.
“Very well,” Grief answered. “The place is dead, and I'm going ashore to see Mataara and find out the situation.”
“It's a tough bunch; keep your eyes open,” the captain warned him. “If you're not back in an hour, send word off.”
Grief took the steering-sweep, and four of his Raiatea men bent to the oars. As they landed on the beach he looked curiously at the women under the schooner's awning. He waved his hand tentatively, and they, after giggling, waved back.
“Talofa!” he called.
They understood the greeting, but replied, “Iorana,” and he knew they came from the Society Group.
“Huahine,” one of his sailors unhesitatingly named their island. Grief asked them whence they came, and with giggles and laughter they replied, “Huahine.”
“It looks like old Dupuy's schooner,” Grief said, in Tahitian, speaking in a low voice. “Don't look too hard. What do you think, eh? Isn't it the Valetta?”
As the men climbed out and lifted the whale-boat slightly up the beach they stole careless glances at the vessel.
“It is the Valetta,” Taute said. “She carried her topmast away seven years ago. At Papeete they rigged a new one. It was ten feet shorter. That is the one.”