Lawson smiled affably, and a slight tinge suffused the creamy cheek of Lâlia.
“And now, Mr. Lawson, as you are so very anxious to get back home I will not delay. Here are my wife and my native assistant as witnesses. Stand up, please.”
“Get in, you little beast,” said Lawson, as he bundled Lâlia into the boat and started back home, “and don't fall overboard. I don't want to lose the Best Asset in that Fool's Estate.”
When the consul, a week later, came down to take possession of Etheridge's “estate,” he called in at Safune to ask Lawson to come and help him to take an inventory. Terere met him with a languid smile, and, too lazy perhaps to speak English, answered his questions in Samoan.
“He's married and gone,” she said.
“Married? Aren't you Mrs. Lawson?” said the bewildered consul, in English.
“Not now, sir; my sister is. Will you take me to Apia in your boat, please?”
And that is how Lawson, the papalagi mativa (poor white) and “the best-hearted fellow in the world,” became a mau aha—a man of riches, and went, with the Best Asset in Etheridge's estate, the calm-eyed Lâlia, to start a hotel in—well, no matter where.