Barry Pain

“ I have only kept my people in hand up to this point by promising them that a day should come when not one white man would be left on the island if only they would be patient. If they used violence, then my plans would be spoiled—they would be punished—the men-of-war would come—the whole island would fall into the white man’s hands. And, Mr Lechworthy, even if you had not come I should have kept my word, for when a man wants only one thing, and wants it very badly, he must get it in the end. ”

“ It’s terribly easy to be misled by one’s political passions; when one is doing evil that good may come one forgets that one is doing evil. That was one of the things I had to keep in my mind when Smith gave me that warning about you. But there were others. You won’t mind if I put it plainly.”
“By all means,” said Pryce, rolling a cigarette.
“I thought about the Exiles’ Club. Here are these poor chaps, I thought to myself, who have found a corner of the world to hide in. They no longer constitute a danger to Society. They ask nothing but to be left alone—to be hunted no longer. ”

“ He betrays us all to Lechworthy, and I consider even now that disaster may come of it. For that crime—there is no other word for it—the punishment is death, and it will be for you to administer the punishment. It’s rough-and-ready justice perhaps, but it is justice. When a coloured native race and a white race live together on an island, the natives must be made to take their proper position; the penalty for treachery must be sharp and sudden if it is to act as a deterrent. ”

“ Two gorgeous butterflies chased one another over the lawn in the sunshine.
[2]
The plaited blind in front of the French windows was pushed back and Sir John Sweetling appeared on the verandah. He was a man of fifty-five, six feet in height and inclined to corpulence. On the whole a handsome man, with a short white beard and moustache neatly trimmed, and fearless blue eyes under shaggy white brows. The nose was perhaps a trifle nosey. He wore a white silk shirt, white ducks, a brown holland jacket and a panama of the finest texture.
Sir John lingered for a moment beside the parrot’s perch. ”

“ And then Lechworthy filled his pipe, and they took their coffee on the verandah, and talked long and seriously.
It was of the death of the native races that the King spoke—and of his own ambition, that Faloo should become a refuge for them from the deadly effects of civilisation, that in the future no white man should ever be allowed to set foot there. Let Great Britain undertake just that work of protection and close the island definitely to all but the natives. Let her say that neither British nor French nor German, nor any other white man, might land there. ”

“ If they do not think I am yet fit for the high honour of membership, I must wait. It is bad to force oneself. I can wait very well. There was a time when every inch of this island belonged to my forefathers; but I must remember that I own comparatively little myself. I am a king by direct descent; but I must not forget that I am a poor trader far more than I am a king. I owe much to the white man. It is his money that has helped me to develop the resources of my island. It is to the white man that I owe my education. Many are kind enough to come in sometimes for a little chat with me. ”

“ I do not make friends easily. In questions of politics, and even, I fear, in questions of faith, we are as far apart as the poles. But I—I’ve formed a very high opinion of you, doctor, and I want your friendship.”
“Well,” said Pryce, “you force my hand. I thought it would come to it. Before you say anything further, Lechworthy, there is something you ought to be told. Sit down here, won’t you? At one time, to save the men of the Exiles’ Club, I was ready and eager to murder you and many others.”
“You meant,” said Lechworthy, “to sink the Snowflake?” ”

“ As they went, the King told Lechworthy all that he wished to know about the Exiles’ Club.
“But how can you permit it, sir—this lazar-house, this refuge for the worst scum of Europe polluting your beautiful kingdom?”
“I have not only permitted it, I have even—in vain—tried to become a member of the club. I have done even worse. My friend, if a man wishes to escape from a prison, he will use good tools, if he has them, to break through the walls. And if he has not good tools, he will use anything that comes to his hand—rusty iron, old nails, anything. ”

“ If I attempted to carry out your scheme, the only result would be that a few travellers would turn out of their course from curiosity to visit your island, and that precautions would be taken, of a kind which you would resent, to see that they came to no harm.”
“My people are not cruel,” said the King. “They are gentle, a little lazy, but good-humoured, if the white man will leave them alone. To-day I have more power than ever before; I shall not be again disobeyed.”
“I believe that to be true,” said Lechworthy. “But we are a cautious people, and this outbreak is dead against you. ”

“ Sell your trading-vessels, the one link that binds Faloo to the world outside. You tell me that the island produces all that a native needs; limit yourself to that. It may be that trade of its own accord will come to you; some soap manufacturer may try to buy your plantation or even the entire island. Refuse him. Do not be tempted. If chance visitors should come here, treat them with humanity but without hospitality; make it unlikely that they will return. The story of the Exiles’ Club will be known, and the island will no longer be a refuge for the uncaught criminal. ”

“ The societies that are to be permanent grow without plan, much as a coral island grows. The schemed Utopia never lives; it leaves no room for compromise and becomes pot-bound; it guards with wise foresight against numberless events which never happen, and the unforeseen event blows in upon it and kills it.
The Exiles’ Club had never been planned at all. The first of its members to arrive at Faloo—Sir John Sweetling—had not the slightest intention of starting such a club. ”

“ Any European power that claimed Faloo would be met by a counter-claim from another power, and at present it is considered too obscure and insignificant for diplomacy, or for sterner methods of arbitration. Briefly, it is not worth fighting about. But I know that you will agree with me that it is just what we require. Life is soft and easy, and the climate is always summer. Nature has showered her gifts upon this island—gorgeous flowers and luscious fruits, the graceful and [13] useful palm, the orange trees in the shade of which we sit.”
“Pardon the correction,” said Dr Soames Pryce. ”

“ Sir John and Dr Pryce took their Manhattans on the verandah. “Do you know,” said Sir John, “I almost thought you were going to elect King Smith this morning.”
“So did I,” said the doctor. “Believe we ought to have done it too. He’s better than that worm Charley Baringstoke, or a boozer like Cyril Mast, or a mean badger like Bassett. Better than most of us, in fact. It was Bassett put me off it.” ”

“ Eight years before he had been a prosperous Lancashire manufacturer. Then for a week he had gone mad; and as his madness did not happen to be of a certifiable kind, he was now paying for it with the rest of his life in exile. He was the best chess-player in the club and perhaps the best all-round shot; with the revolver Dr Soames Pryce was in a class by himself. Hanson spent four hours every day over chess. He used work where the Rev. Cyril Mast used whisky, and he had not let himself slip down even in a climate where all occupations are a burden. ”

“ Soames Pryce stood on the steps below looking up at her, saying something in a low voice to which she listened with happiness.
Lechworthy’s mind was preoccupied, not only with his dream of a native Faloo, but with this Parget, this scrap of London that met him suddenly in the Southern Seas. He admired the courage and resource of the man, as much as he hated his profession—necessary of [270] course, lamentably necessary, but scarcely ennobling and foreign to that way in which Lechworthy had come to regard all sinners. ”

“ I have your pamphlet about Setton Park, and I have many copies of the Morning Guide containing articles signed by you. I cannot tell you with what joy I found it was you that the Snowflake had brought. You, perhaps more than any other Englishman, can help us here.”
“Every minute, sir, I become more surprised. Here, many hundreds of miles from civilisation, I find a native king who speaks English like an Englishman, procures and reads the English papers, even knows something of such a seventh-rate politician and busy-body as myself. ”

“ Once one has to explain away, one exposes a weakness and provokes a mistrust; the chance was never too strong, and with that weakness the chance vanishes altogether.”
The King wrinkled his brows. “I do not much understand these political affairs, but I trust you. If you say that it is so, it is so.”
“You had much better trust me,” said Lechworthy, without temper and quite [314] placidly. “You see, Scotland Yard has lost a man, and it knows the route to Faloo, and it does not let things slide. It is only my story of what happened which can save serious trouble for this island.” ”

“ Hilda had determined that her uncle was to be told nothing at present. On the Snowflake she would tell him all, and slowly win him over. She would make him see that her happiness was here with her lover—not in Europe without him. At Tahiti she expected to part from her uncle, and to remain there until the Snowflake brought Pryce to her.
“You see, dear,” she said, “just at the beginning of things one wants to shut out all the rest of the world, even one’s nearest relatives and people to whom one is devoted. In London that can never be. ”

“ Wilberforce Lechworthy, childless and a widower, had been glad to adopt Hilda Auriol, one of his married sister’s very numerous family. At the age of six he professed to have detected in her a decided character. [60] She was now twenty-three, and her uncle was very fond of her, but she was perhaps the only person of whom he was much afraid. Let it not be supposed that her temper was either sour or dictatorial. She was sunniness itself, and her criticism of life—including her uncle—was fresh and breezy. Her perspicacity detected and her soul abhorred anything that was specious and plausible ”

“ Lechworthy thought of the card-tables. “Bassett,” he said, “it’s not about Mast but about yourself that I wish to speak. Many have looked for you and have not found you. I have found you unwittingly—I think because I was sent to find you. You are a thief, Bassett. You are a murderer, for one of those [88] poor women whose property you stole took her own life.”
“I am absolutely innocent, Mr Lechworthy. I have a complete explanation. You—should be careful, sir. I have seen men shot dead on this island for saying less than you have said to me.” ”

“ I know very little about such things, but I have friends at Auckland who would help me. I’m fond of sailing.”
“You’re to be envied,” said Grice. “No business, no House of Commons. Nothing to do but enjoy yourself.”
Lechworthy fixed his rather fanatical eyes on him. “Nothing to do but enjoy myself? That would be a poor kind of life, Grice. No, no. Let me use my holiday as I have tried to use politics, journalism, and even the business with which I have just disconnected myself—to the highest service of all.”
“Quite so,” said Hutchinson. ”

“ But Mr Bassett suddenly adopted a conciliatory and even flattering attitude towards Dr Soames Pryce.
“Excuse me,” he said. “Better take things in their order of importance. Dr Pryce—most popular and representative—better hear him first.”
“My mind’s still open,” said Dr Pryce. “Sir John’s been talking rather as if the Exiles’ Club were the Athenæum and King Smith were a doubtful archdeacon. We aren’t the Athenæum. We represent the dead-beat [20] section of the conquering races. As we have referred to the past I may mention that we comprise men who have had to skip and can’t go back.” ”

“ Well, enjoying at least my membership of the Exiles’ Club. Now I do not want to break a tacit understanding by referring to the past history of any of us. Some may have made mistakes, or yielded to some unfortunate impulse; some—my own is a case in point—may be the victims of conspiracy on the one part and misunderstanding on another. But in any case, if ever we had to leave Faloo, where could we go? ”

“ But that is merely a temporary arrangement, for if the King and Lechworthy succeed in doing what they intend to do, there will be no more trading. Under the trader lies the patriot. The King’s scheme is that Faloo shall be the asylum of a dying race. You were not far wrong, Sweetling. It is to be Faloo for its own people. No white man is to set foot on the island. Civilisation is not to contaminate it, for civilisation kills the native. ”

“ A long line of natives, laden with flat baskets, passed and repassed, carrying the debris of the burned house down to the shore. It was forced labour, the punishment given them by the King, and six men of the patrol, armed with rifles, watched them at their work. Other gangs had been sent out to work at road-making. They hated the work, but they did it submissively, lest worse should befall them. There was not a corner of the island now in which Hilda or Pryce, or Lechworthy might not have walked with perfect security, unarmed, by day or night. ”

“ It was the King who was Lechworthy’s principal source of information, and the King had many strange stories to tell of the Exiles’ Club.
[230]
Lechworthy had not often been brought into contact with bad men and criminals, and his idea of the bad man was crude to the point of childishness. He would have admitted that we were all sinners, and that even the best of men have their trivial defects and lapses, but he had always thought of criminals as men bad all through, bad in every thought and act. He had never realised the share in humanity that even the worst men sometimes hold. ”

“ Besides, he is not a vindictive man; his conscience is his only guide, and if his conscience does not prescribe a man-hunt now it will not prescribe it then. I know something of Lechworthy. He would cut his hand off—and do it cheerfully—to convert us, so that we gave ourselves up to what is called justice; but to pursue and to punish is not in his nature. Besides, his gratitude to Pryce will hold him. ”