Fanua welcomed them at the door with the musical Kapuan salutation “Talofa, Alii,” and then hastened away to finish preparing the breakfast with her own hands, a duty never entrusted to another.
“Your wife?” the count asked. Klinger nodded, but his hasty flush told plainly that the acknowledgment was a slight mortification before this superior gentleman.
“I’m here for life,” he replied, as if he deemed it necessary to explain. “Kapua is no place for a woman of our race to live, and I needed a companion. I was lonely. Fanua is a queen, in spite of her brown skin.”
The count put out his hand in ready sympathy. Klinger took it gratefully, and no more was said.
“Did you get that hound, Ben Stump?” Captain Scott asked eagerly after a short silence.
Klinger nodded. “The chief of police was after him. He’ll be found unless he left Ukula.”
“He took with him some papers,” Scott explained. “I didn’t find it out until a few minutes before we sailed, and the count would not wait. Have you any one you can trust to send back to get them? If the American man-of-war captain reads them before I get clear of these islands, it’s all over with me and the ‘Talofa.’”
“We’ll have you clear in short order now,” Klinger encouraged. “Have you breakfasted?”
The count and Scott declined to partake of the tempting food set before them. Klinger ate hurriedly, his wife serving him, while the count and Scott walked to the door, from whence they looked out upon the increasingly busy scene. The village of Saluafata was being invaded from all directions by the followers of Kataafa. They were arriving by road, long lines of almost naked warriors and half clad women, and the beach was already crowded with the canoes of those who had come by water. Each village as it arrived selected its own spot for preparation.
Klinger soon joined his companions. Such gatherings of the natives were old stories to both Klinger and Captain Scott, but to the count the sight was one of absorbing interest.