OCR Text |
Show DPI CAe had lived he would have made part of these islands yours, Karen." "We don't know that," Karen said. "I don't believe he ever even heard I was alive. Oh, what a shocking shock-ing deprivation!" "He undoubtedly did not know you were alive," Colt agreed. "If he 'had known it, he would never have let them get his island away from him. He would have saved it for you. A lonely old man, with no kin left so far as he knew it's reasonable that he should be reckless with his property; and undoubtedly he was very hard beset when he sold Ala-koa. Ala-koa. But if Garrett Waterson had known he had a granddaughter, things would be different now." She looked at him gratefully. It was hard to imagine John Colt failing fail-ing in anything; and this, rather than his smile, with its easy, superficial super-ficial warmth, conveyed a certain reassurance to Karen. "I have been very fortunate in finding out what we needed to know," John Colt said now. "Some of it has cost a little money, but not too much. I'm glad to say that all reports are extremely favorable. We have dug up more witnesses, and more conclusive testimony that we could possibly have hoped. And when it comes to the present condition condi-tion of your island " "It isn't my island yet." "You simply have to hold in mind that it is rightfully yours. And it's going to be yours in actuality. Your claim has a wealth of legal precedent prece-dent here, principally because of the white man's habit of separating the natives from their things. What I started to say is that the Alakoa plantations are in wonderful shape I don't see how they can possibly net less than forty or fifty thousand a year. There will be no trouble at all in financing a continuance of activity, ac-tivity, without any hitch, as soon as you take over. Old James Wayne has evidently been an excellent manager. After you have taken possession, pos-session, it may prove wise to employ em-ploy him as such. That would be feasible with some men I don't know whether or not it will be possible pos-sible with James Wayne." The driving energy behind John Colt never caused him to hurry, nor to stumble. He knew how to attack swiftly, but his plan of attack was heard it said he was in the opium trade. And then again I heard it said he was trading Chinese girls; and if any authorities took to overhaul over-haul him why, he just drowned 'em." "Do you happen," Colt asked Harney, Ha-rney, "to know of anything that Richard Wayne actually did?" Ramey, who hated to have his stories winnowed out, put forward his next offering with some heat. "Well everybody knows about the time he threw the U. S. Revenue officer overboard. I don't know why they never hooked him for it, but 1 got my suspicions. And everybody knows he was the one who shot old Chief Tahiti, and the only reason he never come to trial, the natives wouldn't let the French authorities take him, and the whole business got lost in the files. And then there was the time he boarded the British merchant sloop, and took the captain cap-tain off, at sea; and nothing came of that because nobody on the sloop, not even the captain himself, would testify. All such phoney stuff, like that . . ." "But what does he do to make money?" John Colt asked. Ramey looked sulky. Karen Waterson Wa-terson saw a hopeful flicker pass CHAPTER I The weathered, one-eyed little pilot pi-lot who called himself Captain Ramey Ra-mey was an unfamiliar figure on the terraces of Honolulu's luxury hotels; he was here now. at the same table with Karen Waterson and John Colt, only because he was trying to persuade per-suade Colt to charter his Diesel boat In this oonnection he was telling tell-ing a rambling story concerned with reefs and shoals, and the tricky currents cur-rents of the South Seas; but now he stopped abruptly in mid-sentence. His single eye was looking across the lanai of the Royal Hawaiian, across the dimly lighted little tables, to the steps which led onto the open air terrace where they sat. "There he is," he said after a moment. His voice dropped from its narrative sing-song to a tone of reality. "That man, there on the steps, is Tonga Dick." Karen Waterson, her lashes veiling veil-ing her sharp curiosity, moved her head a little, slowly, so that she could look at the white-clad figure Ramey pointed out. "The one with the tray of dshes? Oh, excuse me, I was looking at the wrong door." The man. designated as Tonga Dick moved down to the lanai with a loose leisure. The lights of the hotel lounge were behind him, i so that the girl could not see his face; but she saw that he was slim as a slat," and that his slow stroll almost slouched and almost swaggered, while denying both. Watching him, Karen gathered a suggestion of easy-going arrogance which she found faintly intimidating perhaps because she had too often tried to imagine what this man was like. A table captain led Tonga Dick to feyS: r a place at one side, under a wine palm. Karen saw a match flare in the shadows as he lit a cigarette; then, she turned back to the two men at her table. A shiver had run across Karen's shoulders as she turned from her inspection in-spection of Tonga Dick, but she was not cold. No one could be cold in that mild, blossom-fragrant air. The truth was that she was disturbed by a sense of utter unreality. Honolulu Hono-lulu itself seemed unreal, and the night lanai of the hotel seemed the most unreal thing in it. Mostly that illusion was in the texture of the night itself. It was in the mild caress of the soft air, and in the strangely quieting, strangely exciting odor of many blossoms. The half-darkness of the starlight seemed full of the ghosts of long forgotten for-gotten things, crowding close in the warmth of a night that could not turn cold. Karen supposed, she would have felt differently if she had been here as a tourist, to relax and to enjoy, but she was not. For the first time in her life Karen found herself in a position of attack instead of defense gambling for stakes that a year ago would have been beyond her belief. Ramey, the little one-eyed sea-tramp, sea-tramp, was talking to Colt about Tonga Dick. Like a hundred others who odd-jobbed in the Islands, the weather-faced Ramey contained a vast store of Island information mostly unusable and very little else; "This here Dick Wayne Tonga Dick he's what you might call the black sheep of the Waynes." "He don't figure" much, around Hawaii," Ramey explained "nothing "noth-ing like his uncle does, not even like his two brothers. Generally speaking, speak-ing, you can leave him out of the picture." "My experience," John Colt said, "is that to leave any factor out of a picture is like leaving a plank out of a ship." John Colt's pleasant, deeply suave voice carried the reassurance re-assurance of actuality and of the things which John Colt knew how to control. "Black sheep or not, he can't be insignificant, because he is one of the Waynes." "In some ways," Ramey admitted, admit-ted, twirling his whisky soda, "Tonga "Ton-ga Dick has been the most talked about bf all the Waynes." "Talked about?" Colt prompted.. "He was always the wild one," Ramey remembered, "even when he was a kid. He pulled out on his own when he was eighteen." "How is it he's talked about," ti i-"t .Mrrnrla "if ho'c nOTof always uiuruugu uj me la&i ueid-u. "I have not the least doubt," he told Karen, "that we'll win your case. Of course there will be several sev-eral appeals. But I am now convinced con-vinced that in the end Alakoa will be yours, just as inevitably as sunrise. sun-rise. Very little is left to be done." Karen drew a deep breath, trying to contemplate rationally this incredible in-credible dream in which she, unaccountably, un-accountably, found herself playing a living part. "The one thing I would like to know now is just what this Richard Wayne, this so-called Tonga Dick, is doing here." "He's one of the brothers, isn't he? Isn't it natural that he should come back under the the circumstances?" circum-stances?" . "Possibly; but not necessarily. Richard Wayne mayV may not expect ex-pect to inherit a part interest in the island of Alakoa. Certainly he has been at outs with his whole family for some time. I would like to know exactly why he is here." "But if our case is complete " "One thing could beat us, and break our case completely, and lose you Alakoa forever. One thing, and only one thing." "And that?" "If you don't mind, I'd rather not discuss that angle of it, even with you." His eyes did not avoid her as he said that; his practiced air of candor can-dor remained imperturbable. Nevertheless, Never-theless, a small unwelcome chill touched Karen. A shadow of something some-thing very like unpleasant mystery was beginning to creep into a situation situa-tion that was already disturbing. "It must be something pretty poisonous," poi-sonous," she said. "On the contrary, it is a contingency contin-gency that I think improbable in the extreme. I think it is impossible that we lose. But I still would like to know more about Richard Wayne." "Why wouldn't it be a dandy idea," Karen said hopefully, "for me to talk it over with Tonga Ricbnrd himself?" "For you to what?" "Ask him why he's here." "Are you being funny?" "Well, isn't he the only one who knows?" "Ha-ha," said John Colt dutifully, mistaking his cue. "I mean it John," Karen said. "1 suppose Richard Wayne's brothers know what I look like, by this time. But Tonga Dick has just arrived; it's very possible that neither you nor I have bee"n pointed out to him. If not why can't Mr. Wayne and I "Well, everybody knows about the time be threw the U. S. revenue officer overboard." across his features, and she knew it represented Ramey's impulse to make up an answer to suit. But the Sicker died. Something hard and watchful was always waiting behind Colt's habitually genial eyes. After men had known him for a little while they did not offer him homemade home-made stories about anything. "I don't know," Ramey said sullenly. sul-lenly. Suddenly he flared up. "Give me a few weeks below the line," he almost snarled. "If you think there's anything in the everlasting Pacific that I can't find out " Karen Waterson was amazed at the ferocity of the little man. Very evidently, Ramey's pride was touched. If an odd-job man in the Pacific did not possess a futile omniscience, om-niscience, presumably he possessed nothing at all. But now John Colt sat back; his candid air of interest withdrew itself, it-self, gracefully, not too fast. "I'll see you later, Ramey. Let me hear from you in a week." For a moment Ramey was motionless, mo-tionless, reluctant to leave a scene which he could seldom afford; but he tossed off his drink and rose. "Okay," he said. "Good night, Miss Waterson." When he was gone John Colt rested rest-ed his folded arms upon the table and leaned across it toward Karen. "Frightened" he asked sympathetically. sympa-thetically. She met his steady gaze with eyes that were clear and caol under dark brows. "Wherever I am," she said, here?" "People keep wondering what his racket is," Ramey said. "After Tonga Ton-ga Dick broke off from his uncle, people always wondered what he was up to, and how he got by so well. He's got him a good fast schooner, carrying both power and sail, and he goes whacking around the South Pacific, all over, from Viti Levu to the Tuamotus. Used to be, people thought he was in the copra trade; and even after the price of copra went to nothing, some still figured he was trading shell. But that boat of his can't carry any cargo ain't built for it. And there's always been others tliat said well you know how people talk." "They said ?" "Oh, of course there was always a lot of wild stories," said Ramey deprecatorily, but with relish. "I've "there will always be a little of the spirit of fresh country butter, unconscious un-conscious and unsubdued. No, I'll be honest. I do feel a little lost. I think." "You'll be over that in a few days. After all, aren't you practically a native daughter? You mustn't forget for-get that you came within an ace of being born in the Islands yourself, child." "There's nothing here," Karen murmured, "that doesn't seem strange. Even all these people from the Pacific coast look strange, as if they didn't belong here. Like snow on a straw hat. I don't feel as if I belonged here either." He -operated his reassuring smile. "But. you see. you do belong here These islands were your grandfather's grandfa-ther's stamping ground before any of these people were born. If he have a clubby little chat?" John Colt looked at her acutely; undoubtedly she had surprised him. "Just what is it you want to do?" "Well for instance, if you will leave the table. I'll have him come and sit in your place." Partly. Karen knew, the suggestion sugges-tion was born of an irrepressible curiosity to know more about Tonga Dick. But partly also it was the result of a desire to take part in action ac-tion any kind of action that would relieve for a little while her intolerable intolera-ble drifting in currents which she could not control. John Colt slowly sipped the remainder re-mainder of his Scotch before he replied. re-plied. Almost visibly she saw him conclude that, after all, Karen knew little that could prove helpful to the Waynes. (TO BE CONTINUED) |