He gave me an obscure look, and turned away with the remark:
“I think you’ll find the reason in a few hours.”
He must have felt the hurt in my silence, and opened a confidence on another tack.
“You have noticed, Mr. Tudor, that there are no women, children, nor domestic animals in this village. Do you infer anything from that?”
“What is your inference, Captain?”
“The village is not inhabited. The natives live back of those mountains to the west. This is merely a receiving-station for wrecks and castaways.”
The shrewdness of the king was not hidden by his hospitality. I did not overlook the inquiries that he made among the colonists with Gato’s help, nor his private colloquy with Mr. Vancouver, nor the thoughtful look of that gentleman when it was over.
The banquet was ended; the colony was reassembled before the throne; the king, backed by his now sedate fan-wielder, seated himself; and Captain Mason, Christopher, and I stood ready. We were made to understand the following:
We had not been invited to this island, but the misfortune that landed us on it would be respected. Two circumstances ruled the situation. One was that no vessels from the outside world ever put in here, and hence our means of escape were restricted to such resources as the king might devise; the other, that our intercourse with the people would not be permitted beyond a certain limit. The king explained that in youth he had gone abroad and found that the ways of white people were not suited to the islanders, who would be demoralized should they come under our civilization.
At intervals he sent his people, two or three at a time, in a small boat to the nearest islands, some hundreds of miles away, with native products for barter. But so great had been their precautions that the situation of the island had never been discovered. In these boats one or two of us would be taken away at a time, and thus placed in the path of ships that would assist us homeward.