H. De Vere Stacpoole

“ Just let themselves be driv’ like sheep and kicked like terriers. It’s the same with the Kanakas on this island, I expect.”
“He’s got a personal ascendancy over them,” said Connart.
“I reckon he’s got something like that,” said Captain Bowlby.
III.
In a week they were settled down, and a few days later, the cargo having been landed and stored, the Golden Light took her departure.
They went down to the beach to see her off, they watched her topsails vanish beyond the reef, and they returned feeling very much alone in the world. A good man is warmth and light even to the souls of sinners. ”

“ It’s a good climate and will suit your wife. You won’t make a fortune, but you won't do badly if you stick to your guns and don’t let the Kanakas get the weather gauge on you. There’s only one man there. Seedbaum is his name. He’s a tough customer, by all accounts, but there’s copra enough for two. I know a schooner you can have—the Golden Light. She’s owned by old Tom Bowlby. I’ve got a fellow at a station on Tomasu. That’s a hundred and fifty miles west of Maleku. There’s a cargo waiting shipment there. Bowlby can drop you and your stuff at Maleku; then pick up my cargo at the other place. ”

“ There’s no use in meetin’ troubles half-way, and there’s not an island in the hull Pacific you won’t find trouble of some sort in. If you go in for Pacific tradin’, there’s two things you have to face—cockroaches and men. I’ve kept the old Light pretty free of roaches by fumigatin’, but you can’t fumigate islands. If you could, I reckon you’d see more rats with hands and feet takin’ to the water than’s ever been seen since the Ark discharged cargo. Seedbaum’d be one of them. ”

“ Connart turned.
“Come,” said she to the others. “There is no use talking any more to this person. I will write to Mr. Dobree.”
They turned away, and Seedbaum sat down again to read his newspaper.
“That’s what I said,” spoke Bowlby. “Monkey tricks. You see how he’s placed. Wiart’s gone Lord knows where, and Pacific-coast law don’t run here. The way for you to do is to lay low and then fetch him in the eye unexpected, somehow. Though if you take my advice, you’ll give him a wide offing. There’s no use in fightin’ with alligators. Better leave them be. Hullo! ”

“ He’s only one man, anyway.”
“I don’t know,” said she. “It’s a mystery of human nature. He’s the tyrant type, and it’s always been the same in the world—there’s some sort of magnetism in that type that keeps folk under. ”

“ Dobree, of. San Francisco, gave him the pitch. Connart had the qualities of his defects. Men robbed him, but they liked him. Men are queer things. Dobree, in business, was a very tough person indeed, quite without any finer feelings and never giving a cent or a chance away, yet, taking a liking to Connart, he gave him for nothing a house, a godown, and the chance of success on this island, by the name of Maleku.
“I had a station there up to six months ago,” said Dobree, “but I’m getting rid of my copra interests. ”

“ I bet she’s rudder and compass both to Connart. She and he fit as if they was welded. Did you ever take notice that there’s chaps you meet that’re only half men till they get a woman that fits them clapped on to them? If she don’t fit, they go under the first beam sea they meet; if she do, weather won’t hurt them. ”

“ It seems sort of indelicate to ask people why they don’t come to one’s store. That’s because I’m city bred, I suppose. But I’ll do it. I’ll do it to-morrow morning, first thing. One mustn’t let one’s feelings stand in the way when one’s living is concerned. ”