“That’s the Kapuan custom all right,” O’Neil hastened to say, “but that ain’t the kind of friends we’re looking for. We want you and the old man too on our side; for, Mary, we’re going to be on the right side. We ain’t looking for land. We ain’t swiping native property and refusing to give it back. But hold on,” he added interrupting himself, “I promised to give Bill here a lesson in Kapuan history. You correct me, Mary,” he said, “if I wander from the truth. In spinning yarns these days if you just tell things that happened and don’t invent some, your audience’ll go to sleep before your eyes.
“The king that just passed over to the ‘happy fishing grounds,’” O’Neil began, “was a long time ago, when first made king, no friend of the Herzovinians, so they kidnapped him and sent him into exile. A native chief named Samasese was put in the ‘chair’ by our friends in the Kapuan firm, and this same chief Kataafa then declared war on Samasese. Kataafa licked the king’s army through the town from one end to the other. I saw the fight;—went along with ’em, and had to make a hundred yards in ten seconds flat, getting to cover when the Herzovinian war-ship opened fire on Kataafa’s warriors. If she hadn’t come to Samasese’s help, Kataafa would have run him clean over the point of Kulinuu into the sea.
“Those certainly were warm times. Eh, Mary?” O’Neil exclaimed enthusiastically. “We had a skipper named O’Malley in command of the old corvette ‘Wyoming.’ Stevenson, the great writer, was living then in that big bungalow you can see on the hill back of the town, and he got lots of good material for his books out of the way O’Malley handled the situation.
“O’Malley didn’t care who was king, only he didn’t cotton to the high-handed way the Herzovinians were running things and asking nobody’s consent,” the sailor continued, his Irish blue eyes sparkling with joy at the remembrance. “Samasese was ‘treed’ at Kulinuu and Kataafa with several thousand warriors was surrounding him. There was an American beachcomber named Blacklock who owned a house just outside of the Samasese lines. One night a party of natives from Kulinuu broke into his house to get some grub to eat. They scared Blacklock nearly into a fit. The same night he got on board the ‘Wyoming’ and told a horrible story of brutality to O’Malley. The American commander landed his sailors the next day and encamped at the outraged house. The ‘Wyoming’ anchored in a position to shell the Samasese forts at Kulinuu. O’Malley, then, all day long wagged his Irish tongue as if it was mounted on a swivel and run by a six cylinder gasoline motor. All Ukula said that at sunrise the next day, unless Samasese dug out of Kulinuu O’Malley sure was going to use the king’s camp for his annual target practice.
“The next morning there wasn’t anything alive at Kulinuu except dogs and pigs. Samasese skinned out during the night, and was landed by a Herzovinian war-ship’s boats down the coast there about six miles.”
O’Neil took a deep breath and brushed an insistent fly off his forehead. “Kataafa wasn’t a bit frightened at Herzovinia,” he continued admiringly; “he’s a great fighter, Bill, I can tell you, and if we get into a row with him there’s going to be something doing. Kataafa then got a good start and went up against Samasese good and hard. A sad thing for old ‘Kat.’ Some of his warriors tore down a couple of painted Herzovinian flags and used them for ‘lava-lavas.’ The outraged commodore swore vengeance and declared war on the spot. Kataafa had to run and get his men into a fort before the Herzovinian sailors attacked him. He was just about snugly fixed when a war-ship came trailing along close to the reef to bombard this fort and the native town all around it. Just behind this ship came O’Malley’s ship, the ‘Wyoming,’ and the game old Irishman was on the bridge. He wore riding leggins, a sign that he was going to surprise somebody, and an angelic smile was spread all over his face. When the Herzovinian ship stopped and began to lower her gun ports and run out her guns for business, we followed suit. I thought we’d be on the reef, sure. O’Malley ran the ‘Wyoming’ inside the other war-ship and hung there between her and Kataafa’s fort.
“The other ship made all kinds of foxy moves, but O’Malley covered the plate all the time.
“It was nearly sunset when we heard a voice pipe up from the other ship. Everybody knew it was the commodore who was talking.
“‘I’m going to open fire on my enemy in that town yonder in about five minutes. Kindly chase yourself.’” O’Neil glanced at Mary for a few seconds. “Those weren’t the exact words, maybe, but that was what was meant, anyway.
“Captain O’Malley’s smile got bigger. He took off his white helmet and waved it encouragingly.