“But as she spoke she looked into the water, and my father looked too; and they both trembled. Deep down in the blackness of the sea was it that they saw—yet it quickly came nearer and nearer, like unto a great flame of white fire. It was a tanlfa. Like flashes of lightning did my father dash his paddle into the water and urge the canoe to the land, for he knew that when the tanifa had come to the surface it would look and then dive, and when it came up again would spring upon and devour them both.
“'It is better to give our heads to the men of Falifa than for us to go into the belly of the shark,' he said, 'and it may be we can land, and they see us not.' And so with fear gnawing at their vitals the canoe flew along, and the streak of fire underneath was close upon them when they struck the edge of the coral and knew they were safe.
“They dragged the canoe over the reef and then got in again, and paddled softly along till they passed the light of the fire, and then they landed on a little beach about a hundred gafa (fathoms) away. Then again Uluvao, who was a girl of wisdom, spoke.
“'Listen,' she said, 'O man of my heart. Let us creep through the bushes and look. It may be that these men of Falifâ are tired and weary, and sleep like hogs. Take thou, then, O Lauati, thy shark club and knife from the canoe, and perchance we may fall upon one that sleepest away from the rest, then shalt thou strike, and thou and I drag him away into the bushes and take his head. Then, ere it is well dawn, we will be back in the town, and Tuialo will no longer keep me from thee, for the head of a Falifa man will win his heart better than a fat turtle, and I will be wife to thee.'
“My father was pleased at her words. So they crept like snakes along the dewy ground. When they came to a jagged boulder covered with vines, that was near unto the fire, they looked and saw but one man, and, lo! he was a papalagi—a white man. And then, until it was dawn, my father and the girl hid behind the jagged rock and watched.
“The white man was sitting on the sand, with his face clasped in his hands. At his feet lay another man, with his white face turned up to the sky, and those that watched saw that he was dead. He who sat over the dead man was tall and thin, and his hands were like the talons of the great fish eagle, so thin and bony were they. His garments were ragged and old, and his feet were bare; and as my father looked at him his heart became pitiful, and he whispered to Uluvao, 'Let us call out. He is but weak, and I can master him if he springs upon me. Let us speak.'?
“But Uluvao held him back. 'Nay,' she said, 'he may have a gun and shoot.'