Part 20

He built a fine-appearing wharf, too, and an improved jail with a cement floor, and heaven help anybody who threw fish-guts on the shore or didn't keep his land as clean as a new pin. There was a public well made in the middle of the settlement, with cement steps and a white-painted fence to keep away the pigs, and the natives, though they hated to work, were proud, too, of what they had done, and I doubt if they had ever been so prosperous or freer of sickness. I know Stanley and I doubled our trade, in spite of having to take out heavy licenses, which meant that not only we, but everybody else were that much better off. Petty thieving disappeared entirely, and likewise all violence, and one of the Commissioner's best reforms was a land court where titles were established and boundaries marked out, that stopping the only thing the Kanakas ever seriously quarreled about. Six months of the Commissioner had revolutionized the island, and few would have cared to go back to the old loose days when your only Supreme Court was the rifle hanging on your wall.

Well, it grew nearer and nearer for the _Evangel of Hope_ to arrive, and Mr. Clemm he began to do a most extraordinary thing, which was nothing else than a large cemetery! Yes, sir, that's what Mr. Clemm did, tearing down five or six houses for the purpose on the lagoon side, nigh the wharf, and planting rows on rows of white headstones, with low mounds at each, representing graves. There must have been a couple of hundred of them, and often it was a whitewashed cross instead of a stone or maybe a pointed stake--the whole giving the impression of a calamity that had suddenly overtaken us.

It was no good asking him what it was for; the Commissioner wasn't a man to be questioned when he didn't want to be; all he said was that Stanley and I were to stick inside our stores when the ship came and not budge an inch till we were told. With us orders were orders, but the Kanakas were panicky with terror, and that cemetery with nobody in it seemed to them like tempting Providence. It took all of Mr. Clemm's authority to keep them quiet, and it got out that the Commissioner was expecting the end of the world, and the graves were for those that wouldn't go to heaven! Kanakas are like that, you know--spreading the silliest rumors and making a lot out of nothing--though in this case they couldn't be blamed for being considerable scared. But Mr. Clemm knew how to turn everything to account, and on the principle that the church was the safest place to be found in on the Day of Judgment, ordered that everybody should go there the moment he fired three pistol shots from his veranda. I noticed, however, that the Native Constabulary seemed to be taking the end of the world mighty calm, which looked like they had been tipped off ahead for something quite different.

But the meaning of the cemetery appeared later when one morning, along of ten or so, my little boy came running in to say the _Evangel_ was sighted in the pass. Of course, I stuck indoors, mindful of instructions, though that didn't prevent me from looking out of my upper window and taking in all that happened. The first was a tremendous yellow flag raised on the Commissioner's staff, and the second were those three pistol shots which were to announce the Day of Judgment. Then you ought to have seen the settlement scoot! There was a rush for the church like the animals at the Ark, though old David, the pastor, wasn't any Noah. Him and the deacons were led down to the jail and locked in, and then Peter Jones and his constables divided into two

## parties--three of them returning to the church, while the other three

with Peter got a boat ready, with another yellow flag in the stern.

By this time the missionary vessel was well up under a spanking spread of canvas, with the water hissing at her bows and parting white and sparkling in a way dandy to watch. You could almost feel her shiver at the sight of Peter's yellow flag rowing towards her, and through the glass I noticed a big commotion aboard, with half a dozen racing up the rigging and making signs at those below. It was plainer than words that they had seen the cemetery and were struck of a heap, which was no wonder considering how new and calamitous it looked, with them rows on rows of neat little headstones and nicely mounded graves.

She never even dropped her anchor nor lowered her gangway, but hove to, short; and when Peter came up he was made to lay on his oars and keep his distance, yelling what he had to say with both hands at his face while the captain he yelled back with a speaking trumpet. Of course I didn't hear a word, but it was easy enough to put two and two together, remembering the sea meaning of a yellow flag which is seldom else than smallpox. Yes, that was why we had all took and died in the new cemetery, and that was why the settlement looked so lifeless and deserted! After no end of a powwow they hoisted out a boat, and when it was loaded to the gunwales with stores and cases, it was cast off for Peter to pick up and take in tow. It held half a ton of medical comforts, and I often had the pleasure of drinking some of them afterwards on Mr. Clemm's veranda, where we all agreed it was prime stuff and exactly suited to our complaints.

What old David thought of it all through the bars of the coral jail can only be left to the imagination. He had been banking on the _Evangel_ to turn the scales against Mr. Clemm, and there she was heading out of the lagoon again, not to return for another year! We celebrated it that night with medical comforts unstinted, while the natives they celebrated, too, thankful to find the world still here and the Day of Judgment postponed. Old David wrote a red-hot protest, countersigned by the deacons, and not knowing what else to do with it, sealed it in a demijohn and threw it into the sea, where like enough it still is, bobbing around undelivered to the missionary society and still waiting for the angels to take charge of it.

Mr. Clemm's next move was to start building a small cutter of twenty tons, which he named the _Felicity_ and charged to the government as an official yacht. Old man Fosby had been a shipwright in years gone by, and under his direction the Kanakas made a mighty fine job of the little vessel, which was fitted up regardless and proved to be remarkably fast and weatherly. She was the apple of the Commissioner's eye, with a crew of four in uniform, and a half-caste Chinaman named Henry for captain, whom he had persuaded to desert from a German schooner where he was mate. Mr. Clemm was so fond of taking short cruises in the _Felicity_ that we never gave his coming and going much thought, till one day he went off and never came back! Yes, sir, clean disappeared over the horizon and was never seen again from that day to this, nor the party with him which included several very fine-looking young women!

The natives took it like the loss of a father, which indeed it was, Mr. Clemm being a grand man and universally beloved--kindly yet strict, and always the soul of justice. After giving him up altogether for lost, we put seals on his private effects, and Peter Jones took charge of the government, advised by Stanley and me. It showed the splendid influence Mr. Clemm had had that Peter had become quite a model, and instead of breaking loose was all on the side of law and order. Our idea was to hold the fort until a new Commissioner might be sent, and the only slight change we made was to double our salaries. The natives had grown so used to civilized government that they made no trouble, and we three might have been governing the island yet if a man-of-war hadn't suddenly popped in.

It was the _Ringarooma_, the self-same ship that had landed Mr. Clemm some eighteen months before, and Stanley and I were the first to board her, meeting the captain at the break of the poop, just when he had come down from the bridge.

"I have the honor to report the disappearance of Deputy Commissioner James Howard Fitzroy Clemm," said I. "He sailed from here on March sixteenth in the government yacht _Felicity_, and has never been seen nor heard from since."

The captain, who was a sharp, curt man, looked puzzled.

"I don't know what you're talking about," he said, as abrupt as a thunderbolt.

"Why, sir, you landed him yourself," said Stanley, "and the same day he took possession of the island and hoisted the British flag."

"Annexed us," said I.

The captain frowned very angry, like if we were making sport of him we should fast rue it.

"I never landed anybody here but a fellow named Baker," he said. "I deported him from the Ellice Islands for sedition, bigamy, selling gin to the natives, suspected arson and receiving stolen goods. If he called himself a Deputy Commissioner he was a rank impostor, and had no more authority to annex this island than you have."

* * * * *

Months afterwards we learned that instead of being lost in the _Felicity_ like we all had thought, Clemm had turned pirate in a small way down to the Westward till the natives took and ate him at Guadalcanaar.

CLOUD OF BUTTERFLIES

Behind Apia, on the edge of the Taufusi swamp, was a small collection of huts, jumbled together in squalor and dirt, with pigs dozing in the ooze and slatternly women beating out _siapo_ in the shade. It was a dunghill of out-islanders, Nieues, Uveans, Tongans, Tapatueans, banded together in a common poverty; landless people of other archipelagoes, despised of the Samoans, and paying tribute to the lord of the soil--a few men in war; a grudging hog in times of peace.

Here lived O'olo, a boy of twenty, whose chief-like face, and fine manly bearing marked him as one apart in that nest of outcasts. He was of Tongan blood, though all he knew of his parents was that they had escaped from Nukualofa at the time of the Persecution, and had died in Samoa when he was a child. Old Siosi, who had adopted him, could tell him no more than that; not that O'olo asked many questions, being content to drift on the ocean of life, and careless of anything save what belonged to the day. He weeded taro, occasionally worked for thirty-five cents a day at the unloading of ships; stole bread-fruit and bananas up the mountain, and slept peacefully at night on the stones of Siosi's floor.

If ever he envied the Samoans, the mood was brief, and seldom darkened his spirits for long. To him the Samoans were a race above, with splendid houses, and spacious lands, and a haughty contempt for such an eat-bush at O'olo, the Tongan; and O'olo looked up at them mightily, and respected them as a dog does a man, though sometimes he said: "I wish God had made _me_ a Samoan"; and then the swamp appeared very dismal to O'olo, and the huts mean and noisome, and the mallets seemed to be pounding on his heart instead of the suddy bark.

Now it happened that a new clergyman came to the coral church on the other side of the coconut grove, and what was more important to O'olo brought with him a lovely daughter. O'olo did not know how important it was till he first met Evanitalina in the path, and was so suddenly stricken with her beauty that he had hardly the sense to make way for her to pass. Slim and graceful, with her glossy hair gathered at the nape with a ribbon, and her bright _lavalava_ kilted to the knee, she gave O'olo a glance as sparkling as moonlight on a pool, all her young womanhood alive to his confusion, and quick to divine its cause. Though her eyes had scarcely dwelt on him an instant, she had seen enough for her heart to say: "_Panga!_ What a handsome youth"; and was filled with a strange elation in which there was a dart of pain.

On her return O'olo was still where she had left him, though in his hand was a crimson _aute_ blossom that had not been there before; and when she drew close he held it out, saying: "Oh, lady, here is a little worthless gift!" She took it smiling, and put it behind her ear, and had it been a pig or a fine mat no sweeter could have been her words of gratitude, for Evanitalina had been well brought up, and courtesy was as natural to her as breathing.

"I am named O'olo," said the young man, "and if you like _aute_ blossoms, every day shall I bring you some."

"I am Evanitalina, the daughter of Samuelu, the clergyman," she returned, "and I shall be glad of the blossoms, for as yet thy father has tabooed no lands for our garden."

Then O'olo realized she had mistaken him for the son of Amatuanai, the chief, and while flattered he was also much cast down.

"I am only a Tongan," he said, deprecatorily, shame halting his tongue, "and I live yonder where you see that nameless-animal rooting in the slough--though to God a Tongan is every bit as good as a Samoan, and the only chiefs are those who are strong in faith."

Evanitalina hastened to agree with him, though she was very disappointed just the same, for he was so handsome, and had such pleasant manners, and an air so noble and winning that she had never doubted he was of rank. She herself was of the exalted I'i family, of Safotulafai, and her grandfather was Tu'imaleali'ifano, and her great-grandfather had been Tu-ia'ana. Yet as she went on, the memory of O'olo stayed with her like the scent of frangipani, and for all he was a Tongan and without land or position, she felt a great tenderness for him; and taking the crimson flower she pressed it to her bosom, trembling with joy as she did so, and saying to herself: "I love thee, I love thee, I love thee!"

The next day they met again, and the next after that, and soon the village gossips were all of a chatter, though not a word of it reached the Reverend Samuelu nor his wife. But if Evanitalina dared not tell her parents of O'olo, in her conduct at least she was as good as gold, and every time she held a tryst with her sweetheart, she took her little brother with her as convention demands; and Polo, bribed with sugar cane, sucked and chewed at the pieces O'olo peeled for him, his shaven head untroubled by the woes of his elders. They, alas, were very wretched, for O'olo had saved up two dollars, which was what to get married costs, and was urging Evanitalina to run away with him to Atua; while she, with superior wisdom called his proposal that of a delirious person, for how were they to live afterwards except slavelike on the bounty of others? When he answered they could return to Siosi and the swamp, her lip curled scornfully, and she reminded him she was of the renowned I'i family, accustomed to dignity and ease, to whom the settlement of out-islanders was hardly better than a wallow of nameless-animals.

Now, however true this might be, it was hurtful to O'olo's pride, and he was often goaded into sharp retorts which invited others even sharper, so that their passion might be compared to a mountain, up one side of which they climbed in joy and gladness, to descend on the other in alienation. Not that they loved each other any less; that, indeed, was the most cruel part of it; and when at last they separated it was with breaking hearts.

The days that followed were heavy with sorrow, for each strove ardently to pain the other, and with every stab thus inflicted there were two wounds, one in the giver and one in the stricken person. O'olo spent his two dollars in riot and debauchery, and when released from prison fell into greater evil, so that his communion-ticket was withdrawn, and those who missed taro, or chickens, or run-wild daughters used to say darkeningly: "Lo, it is that Taufusi Tongan," and sought to waylay him with an ax.

Evanitalina, in her turn, encouraged the wooing of Viliamu, a highly-connected young man, whose father was a Member of Parliament, and who earned a dollar and a half a day in the explosion-water manufactory. In this profession he was wondrous skilful, and could be seen daily under a shed, directing the apparatus, and giving orders to his helpers like a white man. A bottle of explosion-water held no more than half a coconut, yet it was sold for ten cents, and it was a perplexity that anybody liked it, for it shot up your nose like the rush of a bat, and made you choke and sneeze, as Evanitalina discovered when once Viliamu brought her some. But it was a fine thing to be able to make it, and earn a dollar and a half a day, and dress magnificently, and give costly presents; and though Evanitalina did not love Viliamu she admired him, and accepted his gifts, and thought wickedly how it must afflict O'olo to see her and Viliamu seated on the same mat, or with their heads side by side on the same bamboo pillow.

Nor was Viliamu her only suitor, for there was also Carl, the German half-caste, who was captain of a schooner, and wore trousers and a black sash, and owned valuable property in Savaloalo; Carl who called for her almost every Sunday in a buggy, and took her driving like a white lady, to Vailele or Vaitele or Utumapu; Carl of the ringing laugh, and jolly, smiling face, and tattooed girl-fish on his arm, who could sing, and do tricks with cards, and invent the funniest forfeits when they all played games, and yet, who at leave-time never failed to say with seriousness: "Oh, my pigeon, am I to love uselessly forever?"

Again and again was Evanitalina drawn to take Viliamu, and then to take Captain Carl, for Samuelu was always urging that a final decision be come to, knowing the folly of maids, and the lack and fewness of worthy men for husbands. But as she was on the brink, like a diver pausing before the plunge, her eyes would alight on O'olo, smolderingly regarding her from afar, and then her whole strength would turn to water, and not for anything would she have married Carl, though all Savalalo belonged to him, and all the ships of the sea; nor likewise would she have married Viliamu, even had he owned the explosion-water manufactory and been himself a Member of Parliament, for of her heart there was but one master, and that was the Tongan.

But, alas, there was no coming together, for O'olo in his despair had put himself beyond all intercourse with those of honor, becoming a terror and a scourge, and inhabiting the jail more frequently than Siosi's roof-tree; and nightly, when he was free, he caroused with low companions, drinking gin, and cooking stolen pigs, and eating stolen taro, and saying in his infamy: "Why should I work for thirty-five cents a day when all the Tuamasanga is mine?"

Yet the rich food had no flavor in his mouth, and though the gin maddened his spirit, it could not drown his wretchedness, for deep within him, like a maggot in a bread-fruit, was the torment of love. Sometimes in prison he would lower his head like a cow, and run at the wall, exclaiming: "I will die, I will die!" And then he would fall, with his beautiful hair all matted with blood, and his beautiful body next to lifeless, though with his purpose unattained, owing to the thickness of his skull. Surely no person in hell was ever more unhappy than O'olo, and it is with grief one tells of him, for he was like a child, who, on being refused a mango throws away his banana in wilfulness--and with him, his banana was right conduct, and the respect of others, and the laws of God, leaving him nothing save an aching spirit.

Then the war came, with the Tuamasanga in an uproar from end to end, every young man being called to arms, and troops pouring in from Tutuila and the westward to join in the onslaught against Mataafa. The Taufusi people, as foreigners, were not liable to the levy except for two striplings by way of rent, both of whom were subscribed with unwillingness, though neither was O'olo. This Evanitalina learned with joy, for death was in the air and bloody fighting nigh at hand, and her tenderness for O'olo, lying secret in her bosom, like a red-hot coal, was fanned to the flame of agony. But no, he was fortunately in the lock-up, and it was reported he had said scornfully of the war: "A Tongan gentleman has no concern with the squabbles of dogs"; which, if insulting, was not without the balm of reassurance to Evanitalina, greatly dreading.

One drowsy afternoon, however, as she was sewing under the eaves, alone except for Polo, who had made a Mataafa soldier of the dog, and was pretending, victoriously, to cut the animal's head off with a piece of wood, as so soon, in reality, would be happening to living men, pierced with wounds, and lying in their blood--one hot afternoon while nothing stirred except the flies, and even these buzzed sleepily, Evanitalina of a sudden was roused by the sound of steps, and looking up, beheld a warrior advancing towards the house. His face was blackened with charcoal, as is the custom, and about his hair was the scarlet scarf of the Government, and against his skin glistened a belt of cartridges; and his walk was fearless and proud, as befitted so handsome a man and one of such noble mien.

"_Talofa_," he said, and then Evanitalina gave a cry, for it was O'olo; and with that cry, every thought vanished except her love, which rose tumultuously within her like a wave bursting between rocks, and foaming white over them, so that she could answer not a word to his greeting, but stared uselessly at him like a dead person.

"I am going to the war," explained O'olo, bending down on his beautiful legs, and bringing his face so close to hers that his breath was on her cheek. "Doubtless I shall die, for with many so brave it will be difficult for me to excel them, though that is my intention at whatever cost."

"But how is it you are not in prison?" inquired Evanitalina, recovering her voice, and speaking in a tremble. "The judge allotted you two months, and lo, here you are with only sixteen days of it expended."