登陆注册
4809100000015

第15章 MAUKI.(3)

For a year Mauki toiled on. Then he was made a house-boy, and had good food and easy times, with light work in keeping the house clean and serving the white men with whiskey and beer at all hours of the day and most hours of the night. He liked it, but he liked Port Adams more. He had two years longer to serve, but two years were too long for him in the throes of homesickness. He had grown wiser with his year of service, and, being now a house-boy, he had opportunity. He had the cleaning of the rifles, and he knew where the key to the store room was hung. He planned to escape, and one night ten Malaita boys and one boy from San Cristoval sneaked from the barracks and dragged one of the whale boats down to the beach. It was Mauki who supplied the key that opened the padlock on the boat, and it was Mauki who equipped the boat with a dozen Winchesters, an immense amount of ammunition, a case of dynamite with detonators and fuse, and ten cases of tobacco.

The northwest monsoon was blowing, and they fled south in the night time, hiding by day on detached and uninhabited islets, or dragging their whale boat into the bush on the large islands. Thus they gained Guadalcanar, skirted halfway along it, and crossed the Indispensable Straits to Florida Island. It was here that they killed the San Cristoval boy, saving his head and cooking and eating the rest of him. The Malaita coast was only twenty miles away, but the last night a strong current and baffling winds prevented them from gaining across. Daylight found them still several miles from their goal. But daylight brought a cutter, in which were two white men, who were not afraid of eleven Malaita men armed with twelve rifles. Mauki and his companions were carried back to Tulagi, where lived the great white master of all the white men. And the great white master held a court, after which, one by one, the runaways were tied up and given twenty lashes each, and sentenced to a fine of fifteen dollars. They were sent back to New Georgia, where the white men knocked seven bells out of them all around and put them to work. But Mauki was no longer house-boy. He was put in the road-making gang. The fine of fifteen dollars had been paid by the white men from whom he had run away, and he was told that he would have to work it out, which meant six months' additional toil. Further, his share of the stolen tobacco earned him another year of toil.

Port Adams was now three years and a half away, so he stole a canoe one night, hid on the islets in Manning Straits, passed through the Straits, and began working along the eastern coast of Ysabel, only to be captured, two-thirds of the way along, by the white men on Meringe Lagoon. After a week, he escaped from them and took to the bush. There were no bush natives on Ysabel, only salt-water men, who were all Christians. The white men put up a reward of five-hundred sticks of tobacco, and every time Mauki ventured down to the sea to steal a canoe he was chased by the salt-water men. Four months of this passed, when, the reward having been raised to a thousand sticks, he was caught and sent back to New Georgia and the road-building gang. Now a thousand sticks are worth fifty dollars, and Mauki had to pay the reward himself, which required a year and eight months' labor. So Port Adams was now five years away.

His homesickness was greater than ever, and it did not appeal to him to settle down and be good, work out his four years, and go home. The next time, he was caught in the very act of running away. His case was brought before Mr.

Haveby, the island manager of the Moongleam Soap Company, who adjudged him an incorrigible. The Company had plantations on the Santa Cruz Islands, hundreds of miles across the sea, and there it sent its Solomon Islands' incorrigibles.

And there Mauki was sent, though he never arrived. The schooner stopped at Santa Anna, and in the night Mauki swam ashore, where he stole two rifles and a case of tobacco from the trader and got away in a canoe to Cristoval.

Malaita was now to the north, fifty or sixty miles away. But when he attempted the passage, he was caught by a light gale and driven back to Santa Anna, where the trader clapped him in irons and held him against the return of the schooner from Santa Cruz. The two rifles the trader recovered, but the case of tobacco was charged up to Mauki at the rate of another year. The sum of years he now owed the Company was six.

On the way back to New Georgia, the schooner dropped anchor in Marau Sound, which lies at the southeastern extremity of Guadalcanar. Mauki swam ashore with handcuffs on his wrists and got away to the bush. The schooner went on, but the Moongleam trader ashore offered a thousand sticks, and to him Mauki was brought by the bushmen with a year and eight months tacked on to his account. Again, and before the schooner called in, he got away, this time in a whale boat accompanied by a case of the trader's tobacco. But a northwest gale wrecked him upon Ugi, where the Christian natives stole his tobacco and turned him over to the Moongleam trader who resided there. The tobacco the natives stole meant another year for him, and the tale was now eight years and a half.

"We'll send him to Lord Howe," said Mr. Haveby. "Bunster is there, and we'll let them settle it between them. It will be a case, I imagine, of Mauki getting Bunster, or Bunster getting Mauki, and good riddance in either event."If one leaves Meringe Lagoon, on Ysabel, and steers a course due north, magnetic, at the end of one hundred and fifty miles he will lift the pounded coral beaches of Lord Howe above the sea. Lord Howe is a ring of land some one hundred and fifty miles in circumference, several hundred yards wide at its widest, and towering in places to a height of ten feet above sea level.

Inside this ring of sand is a mighty lagoon studded with coral patches. Lord Howe belongs to the Solomons neither geographically nor ethnologically. It is an atoll, while the Solomons are high islands; and its people and language are Polynesian, while the inhabitants of the Solomons are Melanesian.

同类推荐
  • 金液大丹口诀

    金液大丹口诀

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 大云无想经

    大云无想经

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • Darwin and Modern Science

    Darwin and Modern Science

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • JENNY

    JENNY

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 玄都律文

    玄都律文

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
热门推荐
  • 末世第一女主宰

    末世第一女主宰

    (锦华章第七世,末世甜宠文,1V1,身心俱干净)末世来临,丧尸横行,因为自卑而远离心中真爱,却害得他横死。重生五年前,这一次她绝不重蹈覆辙。“老大,嫂子又冲到丧尸堆里了!”“我靠,老大人呢?”“老大冲到嫂子前面了!”月冥焰上辈子,这辈子,下辈子,最最最最大的希望就是:在吃人不吐骨头的末世,将焱槿宠得无法无天。晚烟晓寒;读者群:56881865;敲门砖:男主角色名
  • 美味主食花样600款

    美味主食花样600款

    本套菜谱共30本,汇集了南北方以及各种风味的菜系,每本600余种做法。本书介绍主食花样的做法,简单好学易做,是符合大众口味的家居生活常备书籍。
  • 我家有个洛天依

    我家有个洛天依

    本书作者自嗨之作:一次意外,少年穿越到平行世界的地球,这里有前世的up主,这里还有综漫主角,重点都不是这个,我的妹妹竟然是洛天依!位于这个“次元崩坏”的世界,洛影扛上B站大旗,集齐各大up主,收V家,与各路动漫主角秀的风生水起。已混入动漫:食戟之灵、lovelive、路人女主、鹿枫堂,其余待定。已出现V家:洛天依、乐正绫、心华、星尘、言和、乐正龙牙。即将当场(其实也不知道什么出现)V家:初音、徵羽摩柯、墨清弦、战音、镜音双子、巡音、弱音,其余待定。
  • 月光与玫瑰

    月光与玫瑰

    这个甜蜜的当代中篇小说是《阳光明媚,皓月皎洁》的前传。讲述了这样一个故事:卡洛琳·戴维斯拿到了硕士学位后,回到纽约和她的母亲住在一起。琳达·戴维斯知道她总有一天会离开,决意确保自己的女儿拥有一个安稳的未来。卡洛琳有她自己的打算。尽管母女两人时不时会起争执,她们都深爱对方。卡洛琳是一位美丽的女子,也是一位成功的艺术家。她一直敷衍地配合着母亲的计划,直到遇见了布拉德利·瑞沃丹·怀特,这个男人颠覆了她的世界。
  • 温暖和百感交集的旅程

    温暖和百感交集的旅程

    收入了中国当代经典名著《活着》作者余华的随笔作品:《我能否相信自己?》《温暖和百感交集的旅程》《尔赫斯的现实》《诃夫的等待》《鲁佐德的故事》《岛由纪夫的写作与生活》《心之死》《卡夫卡和K》《文学和文学史》《威廉·福克纳》《安·鲁尔福》等24篇。
  • 十二国记之绝美

    十二国记之绝美

    十二国每逢王驾崩,各地便有妖魔入侵、天灾频发,导致民不聊生。因此有人提出,君王的存在对于人民而言并非必要。*意外拥有富江外貌的女学生樊瑜被选为舜国新王,并藉由蚀来到常世。一切均陌生又混乱:主张无王论的庭州,以及全力拥护新王的霖州众人……樊瑜是否能够在巽麒的协助下抚平动乱,并成功即位?
  • 砚北杂志

    砚北杂志

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 第三方物流

    第三方物流

    “本书以第三方物流企业的工作流程为主线,以场景模拟方式引导教学活动的组织,将教学内容进行模块化重组和设计。结合企业实际需求和高等职业教育特点,本书内容涵盖了以下多个场景:第三方物流的行业背景、功能分类、组织结构、供应链管理、业务流程再造、运营管理以及文案写作等。”
  • 雪珂

    雪珂

    清宣统二年,颐亲王府的格格和奶妈之子相恋和怀孕,两人相约私奔,不料一对情侣双双被王爷抓回后,男的被放逐边疆,女的产下一女后,被迫嫁入富豪之家,从此一家三口各自走出一段艰苦又悲惨的命运。然而因为彼此之间的情缘未了,八年后再度相遇,一连串的冲击与折磨却接踵而来,是一段描述清末皇族爱恨情仇的故事。
  • 盗墓笔记:搜宝奇兵

    盗墓笔记:搜宝奇兵

    出身矿山世家的韩风在清早听到了自家矿山发生灾难的消息,父亲葬身在矿山之中,而死难矿工的家属受到有心人的挑唆而前来闹事。在混乱中一些杀手打伤了韩风,老管家福伯竟然暴露出雄厚的实力,带着韩风远遁千里……