Mace squatted on the beach, his curiosity aroused by the old man’s manner.
“My name,” the visitor went on, “is Sagon. The people in the islands near by call me their spirit-man and doctor.”
“Are they very near—these islands?” Mace questioned eagerly.
Sagon indicated a low reef wall in the far south where the Pacific breakers hurled with the sound of gun blasts on the still night air. “Beyond those reefs our people dwell, papalagi! I alone know of your schooner going to pieces on the cruel coral last night. I kept the secret to myself. A spirit whispered that some of the white sailors had reached this island.”
“What do you want to do, Sagon?”
“Come with me to my people. Like a brave man you must take your chance with them. If you stay here you will go mad, or”—he paused and nursed his paddle thoughtfully—“some of the chief’s men will spy you out. Oho, you will then be destroyed without a hearing. Will you come with me?”
“Sure!”
“Then sit in this boat and paddle by direction. It is a long way; my arms have grown stiff.”
Mace clambered into the canoe, glad of an opportunity to escape the dreadful monotony of his sea-girt prison. Far better to die with the voices of men around him than to succumb to madness or plague, alone in the awful wastes of mid-Pacific.
CHAPTER II
A MEANS TO AN END
Day was breaking over the high coral hummocks when the canoe shot into a narrow channel that opened into a dish-shaped lagoon. Myriads of sooty-winged terns and man-o’-war hawks hovered above the dense Pandanus palms that fringed the inner beach. High up on the shelving banks forests of candlenut trees swayed and whispered in the rising southeastern trade winds. The sun flashed its crystal rays over forest and lagoon, where the sponge beds and parrot-billed fish flashed under every dip of the paddle.
A village of palm-thatched huts became visible as the canoe touched the beach. The blue smoke of many cooking fires lay over the forest. Voices of women and men reached Mace, voices filled with laughter and homely badinage, together with the shrill babel of children clamoring for their early meal.
“Say, it sounds good!” Mace declared, stepping from the canoe and assisting the old man to land. “I’ve got no animus against a town like this, doctor.”
Sagon stepped slowly to the beach, his small, black, shriveled figure contrasting strangely with the white man’s abundant proportions. “There is peace now,” he murmured; “but the storm will beat around the council house in a little while. Palotta will provoke it.”
“Is Palotta a woman?”
“She rules here!” Sagon snapped under his breath. “Her father was a brigadier of gendarmery at Nukahiva, over there in the Marquesas. Her mother was a rich Italian and became a queen in these islands. She bought lands from the chiefs and owned twenty trading steamers. Palotta’s mother is dead. She now rules here with her brother Avian. But the chiefs are troublesome, as you will see, stranger.”
“A woman ruler!” Mace commented and was silent.
Sagon hobbled slowly toward the village, pausing for breath and to enlighten Mace further concerning the female ruler of the islands. “Palotta looks after her little kingdom better than most rulers. She has taught her people the value of many things she learned in the school at Apia. She laughs at my medicine and scorns my charms and herbs. There is no love between us, and some day—” He paused and muttered a string of words in the vernacular that were lost on the white man.
“But this darned hate of her own kind?” Mace broke in at last. “Put me wise, Sagon, that I may help myself.”
Sagon shrugged. “A month ago a party of white men landed on the island where I found you. They had come to raid our pearl hatcheries and steal our women for the coffee plantations of Fiji. That was their intention. It was well proved by letters in their keeping. To steal our women and our pearls, to give nothing in return but gunshots, is no bargain to us. There were seven whites in all, and”—the old man made a gesture as he concluded—“you saw the heaps of ashes. So—that was Palotta’s justice. Thou shalt not steal. That is good mission-house talk, stranger.”
They had reached the village where the news of Sagon’s arrival with a white man struck like a fireball. Native women, in their headdress of shells and coral beads, deserted their cooking fires to stare in wonder at the tall stranger striding beside the bent and decrepit doctor. Many of the headmen and warriors assembled at the sudden beating of a war drum, and stood with clubs and spears in hand outside the square, palm-log building in the center of the village.
Hoarse insults were flung at Mace from the more youthful members of the tribe, followed by an aggressive closing of their ranks as he drew nearer. Sagon snarled a word that fell like a lash among them.
“Dogs of the swine yard, can you not see that the papalagi walks with me? His life is my life until the queen decides. Out of our way! Leap, dogs! Begone!”
The skeleton arms of the old doctor made signs that caused the headmen to cover their eyes as though from the unseen shafts of his magic. “Follow me, stranger,” he commanded Mace as he hobbled slowly into the log-built council house.
It was almost dark inside. The walls were hung with spears and weapons of the tribe, with here and there a war god of painted wood or stone. A curiously carved throne of sandalwood stood at the far end of the chamber, its highly polished sides glinting with innumerable pearls inset. Above the throne gleamed a naked skull. Mace drew a deep breath and waited.
Outside the council house the shouts of the crowd fulfilled all Mace’s longings to hear the voices of his fellow men. The voices became hysterical in their demands for the life of the white stranger. Spearheads and clubs hammered the log walls outside. Why was Sagon protecting the pale devil? they demanded.
The old doctor rolled some betel nut in a moist banana leaf and chewed abstractedly, casting from time to time a glance in Mace’s direction.
“Palotta will come with her brother Avian,” he intimated at last.
Mace made no reply. He could not escape a thought that rose in him that Sagon was in some way using him as a means to an end. What wizard impulse had impelled the old medicine fraud to seek him on the atoll? he asked himself.
A sudden silence fell on the hostile crowd outside. A squad of headmen filed quickly into the chamber, long-limbed warriors with the blue-and-red tattoo marks of their tribe on their naked bodies. Each headman carried a short, broad-bladed stabbing spear. Without haste or confusion they ranged about the empty throne and glared at Mace standing beside Sagon.
The old doctor chewed betel with supreme indifference. It was as if fifty well-fed geese had waddled into the council house. “These people,” he said to Mace, “have no more brains than oysters. All day they eat and brag about their deeds. Listen! She is here!”
CHAPTER III
THE VERDICT OF THE QUEEN
A low murmur passed over the assembly. A drumbeat sounded a slow tattoo; it came nearer until the crowd outside fell back in awe, and the cry “The queen comes!” struck sharp on the ears of the white man.
She came on foot and not in a litter of many-colored silks and veils. A youth of twenty towered beside her; his skin was the color of wild honey; his boyish face was alive with the ardor of life and the fierce joy of ruling a wayward people.
Palotta walked easily into the council chamber. For a fraction of time her glance rested on the tall, white man, and then with an air of business she settled on her throne.
Mace suppressed a cry of surprise. She was barely eighteen. He had expected to see a woman of thirty. His heart thumped like a stone within him. The beauty of her face and form was like a thrust from a jeweled weapon. It was incredible! He had pictured a female judge with the face of a vixen, and he was confronted by a type of loveliness that would have shamed half the film queens of Broadway.
Her skin was fairer than her brother’s. It was a golden tan that carried the faint flush of dark roses in her soft cheeks. She w
as staring fixedly at Sagon as if expecting him to speak.
He did, and for the benefit of the chiefs delivered himself in the vernacular: “I found the stranger on the island where the seven scamps were burned. His schooner was wrecked where Trau Kau lifts her fangs above the tide, O queen. Of all the crew he alone reached the shore. He says that the wind blew him out of his course. He had no wish to violate or trespass on our lands.
“He has told me his own story on our way here, in my little boat. In his own country he is a professional warrior, a fist-man. But he will not talk of his prowess as our warriors do. It is hard, therefore, O queen, to believe him a man of great deeds, such as thy noble brother and the great men here assembled.”
Then Sagon subsided into a morose silence. Palotta transfixed Mace with her dark, searching eyes. He met her glance with the composure of one undaunted by fate. In her face there was no sign of hate or condemnation. It was the face of a child thinking hard and swiftly, without reference to the glowering eyes and sullen whispers of the chiefs around her. It was some time before she spoke; then each headman leaned nearer as she addressed Sagon.
“It is hard to believe that white men come here for nothing,” she said. “How often do we hear the story of shipwreck and accident? These islands are far removed from the track of ships. They come, these strangers, and they persist in coming. In the north and west they have swept over our islands and submerged our people. They brought the coughing plague, that scourged us last year. Our numbers have fallen grievously. These islands have become our graveyards. We must protect and enforce our laws.”
A mutter of approval greeted her. Silence fell again as she continued:
“It is hard to pass judgment, but this stranger must go the way of others. There can be no evasion of our law.”
A savage shout welcomed her verdict. The circle of spearmen beamed gratefully upon her. Sagon scratched and combed his thin hair with a talon-like forefinger as one who had listened to a tiresome harangue.
“It is well, O queen,” he said. “The white people are our enemies. This stranger deserves death,” he added with a scowl in Mace’s direction. “Yet there are times when it is foolish to kill without proof of guilt. There are the stranger’s warships,” he suggested meekly.
“And me, too,” Mace declared without heat as he divined something of the argument.
His eyes lighted on a heavy battle-ax hanging from the wall within easy reach. The thought of death did not occur to him. His supreme faith in his own lightning initiative and strength gave a positive joy to the situation. He could not entertain the idea that these slow-footed headmen were capable of finishing him in a mix-up. His health was too raw and buoyant; each limb of his young body refused to believe that human lions could bring him down. His faith in his own invincibility had won him a hundred fights and the sea had trained and tempered him until his flexed muscles leaped.
“Let there be more wisdom in the queen’s second thoughts,” Sagon droned warningly.
“Sagon is right, my sister. This stranger is not proved guilty.” It was Avian who spoke, his right hand resting against the throne. “Although we do not fear the warships, we must do justice. Did the stranger come to steal?” he challenged.
There was no answer from the group of sullen-lipped headmen. The soft noise of Sagon’s chewing merely added to the tenseness of the moment.
Palotta regarded her brother in cold-eyed amazement. Twice she was about to speak, but restrained herself as one in dread of bringing the wrath of the headmen upon him.
Avian came to his own rescue, his boyish face illumined by the overwhelming impetus of his thoughts. “We judge men and destroy them!” he almost shouted. “This man we cannot judge, neither can we allow him to go free to carry the news of our rich lands to the rovers and thieves who lie in distant rivers ready to pounce on us with their accursed ships. We cannot allow this man to go!”
“What then?” came from a score of throats.
Avian folded his long, muscle-packed arms, while the chest above the narrow hips expanded to the fullness of a gladiator. Mace marked him in that moment, the quick, snakelike length of torso, the young neck and shoulders built to smash and kill. And Mace knew what was coming.
“Let the stranger be pardoned,” Avian begged, “so that I can deliver his body to the sharks that lie under the Red Reef. Let this fist-man from the great water go with me to the Ru Trau Kau, and my people shall see that I can cast his body to the sharks. Their hunger is great. The reefs are red where they watch and feast.”
Sagon’s jaws snapped. He looked sharply at Mace while a grin split his toothless mouth. “Wisdom at last,” he said, chuckling, “and from the mouth of Avian the Strangler!”
Palotta moved uneasily on her throne. A word of protest was on her lips that was drowned by the shouts of approval that greeted Avian’s offer.
“Rash boy!” she gasped under her breath. “Your tongue and your pride will humble us both.”
Avian leaned toward her tenderly, his shapely hands touching the gold armlets scarcely visible against the amber sheen of her beautiful skin.
“Your eyes do not meet mine, Palotta,” he whispered. “The fear of the milk-fed babe is in your heart when I choose to fight. I cannot forever be a toy warrior. These headmen doubt my strength, and you have kept me in leash too long. I swear, sister mine, that the stranger will go over the Red Reef, and I will return to you a man!”
Palotta averted her eyes; pain had dulled their childlike brilliance. Her lips were tight set. “You have gone mad!” she murmured.
Her probing eyes measured Mace’s athletic outlines, took in every curve and slant of his physical make-up. The quality and breed of the man was revealed in a flash. She withdrew her glance with a stifled sound in her throat.
“The stranger will not be thrown from the Red Reef, brother mine! Never, never!”
CHAPTER IV
THE PRICE OF A LIFE
There was no mystery about the Red Reef at Langos Bay. It was of coral formation and stood almost in the center of the bay; square-cut, tablelike in appearance, it resembled a red-stone boxing arena when viewed from the beach.
In the past it had served as an altar of sacrifice. In later years, under a more modern regime, it was used as a stage where the young bloods of Langos were permitted to exhibit their skill in wrestling and mimic games of war. On gala days, under the eyes of Palotta, the budding, warriors tested their strength against each other to the shouts of the assembled villagers watching from the beach.
There were other occasions when murderers and felons were clubbed in full view of the community and their bodies cast to the ravening hordes of sharks that cruised in the vicinity. These monsters of the Pacific were fed regularly from the offal thrown to them by the village scavengers and breeders of pigs.
Outside the council chamber Palotta paused and beckoned Sagon who had followed in her wake, leaving Mace in charge of Avian’s bodyguard. Palotta regarded the old man critically, her fingers closing idly on the jeweled haft of a knife in her girdle.
“What evil spirit guided the white man here, Sagon? What devil of chance took your canoe to the atoll last night? Speak; was it chance or more of your schemes for my downfall?”
In her eyes was an unloosed tempest of wrath that was not free from terror for the life of her brother, whose foolish pride and tongue had trapped him into a death duel with the white man.
Sagon blinked at her, and his toothless grin struck new fears into her young brain and heart. “I cannot stop your brother’s tongue, Palotta. His vanity and ambition will yet send him to the sharks. You heard all that was spoken. The thing happened.”
“As you wished it!” she flung out. “There is always a motive behind your actions. I believe that this white man was brought here to provoke Avian!”
“How—how?” Sagon snapped, his impish eyes dilating in sudden rage. “You speak to me like a child, Palotta—I who have watched over you in war and peace. How could this papal
agi have been brought here to provoke your brother? Blame the spirit of the storm, the reefs that open ships and drown the rats and men in them. How could I?”
They walked some distance from the council house, each feeling that the last word had yet to be spoken. In Palotta’s mind was the conviction that the old medicine man had managed to maneuver her into a desperate position. It seemed as if Sagon had chosen Mace to kill her brother. Her instincts warned her that Avian would be as a babe in the hands of Mace. She dared not think of Mace killing him, yet only one of them could leave the coral platform alive. One of them must go down the steep slope to the sharks; and no man’s hand could stretch out to save either.
Palotta halted near a well-constructed house of tamanu wood and sandal logs that stood apart from the low-roofed huts in the main street of the village. It was surrounded by a low stockade where scarlet hibiscus trailed within the well-kept borders. It might have served as the residence of a rajah, and it had been Palotta’s home since the death of her mother, some years before.
“Tell me, Sagon,” she said slowly, “what you know of the white man. Is he dangerous? Is he what you said, a professional fist-man, a wrestler of repute in his own land?”
Sagon chewed blandly, standing in the limestone path. “I do not talk much, Palotta, but this papalagi is Fate. The cruel sea threw him upon us. His name is Darrel Mace. He is nicknamed ‘The Lightning.’ I have looked upon him well, I, who have the gift of seeing through men’s skins and into the muscles of their hearts and brains. By their voices I know if they lie to me. This man is Fate!”
“What do you mean, Sagon?” Her face had lost its childish look of wonder; it had grown marble-white under the strokes of the native doctor’s tongue. She was now quaking for her brother’s life, the boy who had clung to her and who had often risked his foolish young life for her in the past. Sagon knew now that her heart was flinching in his chill grasp.
He combed his lime-washed hair with his talon fingers, his old eyes conning her like a trapped bird.
The Adventure Megapack: 25 Classic Adventure Stories Page 20