Some Pearls and a Swine by Cark Clausen Page 2
the force of the onrushing waters.
truck waved his sou’wester to her.
Bereft of the guiding hand, the
Above the tumult of the wind came
Moonbeam swung broadside to the seas. The faintly the sound of voices. They were
jib blew out with the noise of a blast. Topmast cheering her. From the rigging and yard-arms
and jib-boom went crashing over the side.
flashed a message of tribute from a hundred
Stunned and half-drowned, Maina lo
doomed men. Then suddenly the great bark
groped her way on hands and knees along the
plunged head down in the waves up to the
engulfed deck to the companionway and tore
mainmast. Her stern rose in the air with the
the hatchet from the rack. With bleeding dripping rudder pointing to the sky. One by hands she chopped the tangled rigging adrift
one the men in the rigging dropped into the
to prevent the dragging topmast from sea. The two sailors abandoned their hammers pounding a hole in the side of the boat.
and chisels and leaped from the railing of the
On examination she found the rudder
poop.
carried away. Only a broken splinter of wood
In the stern stood the solitary figure of
remained, swinging uselessly above the water-
a man silhouetted against the sky, with
line. Cutting one of the oars from its lashings, manacled hands raised above his head, the last
she chopped a deep notch in the stern, laid the of the prisoners whom the sailors had
oar in the notch and lashed it securely to the
abandoned in their efforts to save themselves.
top hinge of the broken rudder. Then rising to
A giant of a man he was, with a great shock of
her feet, she threw her weight against the oar
yellow curls dancing in the gale. He was
and righted the boat.
signaling to her, pointing astern with his
She was almost abreast of the manacled hands.
Pappillon. Fifty yards to starboard the great Maina lo measured the distance with
black hull of the prison-ship towered her eyes, cast all her weight upon the oar and
Romance
6
swung the Moonbeam under the stern quarter storm-torn clouds charged the young
of the bark. Tying a bowline in the main
ascending moon.
halyards, she threw the rope overboard and
The storm still raged in the higher
signaled her readiness. With a terrific swing
levels, though but the merest breath of wind
the man brought down his manacled wrists
fanned her cheek as the boat coasted down the
across the hawser-bit, breaking the shackle-
rollers. A blue layer of chill, shroudy mist
chain. Then he leaped.
hung low over the sea with an interminable
Straining at her oar, Maina lo saw his
stretch of clear, sparkling space above. A
head rise in the wake of the sinking bark, a
sinister, brooding peace of fury-gorged
few feet astern. The Moonbeam staggered elements enwrapped the universe.
momentarily as the man caught the dragging
Against the deck the face of the
rope and rose half-way out of the water with
unconscious man glowed ghastly beneath his
the sudden strain. The next moment two matted, brine-soaked locks that moved bloody, mangled arms with the broken Medusa-like in the wash of the deck with the shackle-chains dangling from the torn flesh
pitching of the boat. A strange freak of
were thrust over the railing. Grasping the man
circumstances had placed in Maina lo’s hands
beneath the armpits, Maina lo dragged him to
the fate of one of the hated race. Only in the
safety and sprang back to her oar, just as the
fact that he was a convict and therefore in the last of the Pappillon disappeared beneath the estimation of his own people-no better than
waves.
she, did Maina lo find in her heart a sense of
pity for him.
NIGHT came with the hurricane spent and a
Like herself, he was very young. A
chill moon rising out of the sea. Weary and
downy golden beard covered his vigorous,
worn, Maina lo left her oar and knelt beside
aggressive jaw. His nose was straight, finely
the prostrate form upon the deck. By neither
molded, with sensitive blue-veined nostrils.
sound nor movement did the man betray sign
There was a bold, careless quality in the
of life. One mangled wrist lay across a repose of his face. Where his shirt lay open, forehead white as death. The broken shackle-the skin of his throat glowed soft and velvety
chain swung tangled in his hair with the beneath its coat of sun-bitten tan. A pathetic movements of the boat. She looked at the man
boyish look, reminiscent of a brutally
helplessly. To all appearances he was dead.
disillusioned childhood, hung about the
She had risked her life and boat to no purpose.
corners of his mouth.
When she accidentally touched his
Taking his head in her lap, she began
forehead with the tips of her fingers, she to rub his face and chest briskly and rolled thought she saw a faint flutter of the eyelids.
him back and forth to induce circulation in his She placed her ear against his breast and frozen arteries. After several minutes of listened breathlessly. Barely perceptible yet
unceasing labor she was rewarded by feeling
unmistakably came the soft beating of his
the play of his reviving muscles under her
heart. Life was not quite extinct.
touch. When she placed the water-soaked
For several minutes she sat looking at
blanket under his head, he opened his eyes for
him perplexedly. Across the moon-flooded a fraction of a minute and gazed up at her waste long, swift lines of ponderously cat-unseeingly.
footed rollers moved from horizon to horizon,
Letting her hand fall upon his
breaking in menacing white-capped thunder
shoulder, she leaned over him breathlessly,
about the boat. Phalanx after phalanx of searching his eyes by the faint light of the
Some Pearls and a Swine
7
moon. Deep blue, the color of mother of pearl,
was flooded with warm noontide sunshine.
they gazed beyond her into nothingness. When
The boat swung lazily upon a calm, sunlit sea.
he had closed them again, she sat lost in
She heard him move about on deck.
thought, studying the blank repose of his face.
Wondering, she sat up and looked about.
Then, rising to her feet, with a look of
Before leaving, he had tucked the blankets
determination upon her face, she found the
around her.
hatchet and knocked the cover off the
She crawled on deck and found him
hatchway. Below decks everything was snug
curled up, prison-garbed, on the mainsail with
and tight. Groping about in the dark she found
his back against the mast. She dared not lift
matches and lighted the lantern which swung
her eyes for fear of encountering his. He held
from the beam above the bunk. She extended
out his hand and took hers between his two
br /> her stiff, frozen hands over the flame and
bandaged ones and raised it to his lips,
looked about with a sigh of relief. Not a drop
drinking in the beauty of her with his clear,
of water had the staunch little craft shipped.
boyish eyes.
Returning on deck, she dragged the
Gently withdrawing the hand, she
unconscious man below, dropped him in the
knelt beside him and pressed the spot his lips
bunk and began to strip him of his wet had touched shyly to her breast. No word garments. When she pulled his coarse prison-passed from her lips. He also was silent, but in shirt over his head, she gave a gasp of horror.
his eyes she saw enshrined something which
From the neck to the waist his back was a
she dared not believe true.
mass of horrible, bloody bruises.
The youth of him, for he was but an
She knew too well the mark of a cat-
overgrown, bearded boy, spoke to her own in
o’-nine-tails to be mistaken. Cords of beaten
youth’s breathless language, tremulous with
flesh lay in livid lines from armpit to armpit.
awe and exquisite delight at their mutual
He had been brutally whipped. With a sob of
discovery. Fiercely her spirit assailed the
mingled rage and compassion she worked barrier of blood and found his amid the away feverishly and flung the last of his wreckage.
water-soaked garments on deck. Tender-
It was no mere mortal love which
handed and pitying, she anointed his body
shone from the splendor of her face. The fire
with healing oil from her locker and bound up
in her eyes was love’s refining flame, the
his mangled hands with strips torn from the
beacon that has guided frail humanity through
blankets.
the ages in its wingless pursuit of happiness.
She forgot race-hatred and prejudice in
The sea moved inevitably from
administering aid and comfort to the helpless,
horizon to horizon. Near by a flock of
white-skinned stranger who had come to her
albatrosses fought over a drifting morsel of
out of the sea, bruised and bleeding. She food. She remembered then that she had not rolled herself into the blankets against his icy eaten since the morning before.
body that the warmth of her youth might
When she placed food and drink from
kindle into flame the flickering spark of life.
her locker before him he followed her with his
With maiden shyness she drew his face to her
eyes, eating ravenously the while. Knowing
breast and closed her eyes. An indescribable
the scanty supply, she ate and drank sparingly
feeling of peace and contentment came to her.
herself, heaping his lap with fruit and sun-
She slept.
cured fish. When he had eaten his fill, he drew the sail about him with a grateful smile and
WHEN she awoke, she was alone. The cabin
closed his eyes.
Romance
8
While he slept, she tiptoed about, Frenchman. A stone’s throw to starboard, the repairing the damage done by the storm. great white hull of the brigantine rose out of Every little while she paused in her task to
the phosphorescent sea, a ghostly avenger,
watch him in silent exultation. Bending low
following every, movement of the Moonbeam.
over him, she touched his cheeks shyly with
With a sob of rage and despair Maina
her lips and ran her finger-tips lightly through lo saw her mainsail flap idly in the breeze that the gold of his hair.
began to die with the approach of dawn. At
In the afternoon a strange sail daylight the Moonbeam and the L’Aiglon lay a appeared, bearing down upon them with a
cable-length apart upon the calm, rose-tinged
strong breeze from the east. With a sudden
lap of the sea. From the forward davits of the
fear in her heart, Maina lo recognized the
brigantine a boat was being launched.
L’Aiglon, the swift brigantine of Perrot, the trader.
“WELL?”
Arousing the fugitive, she pointed to
Maina lo drew from her bosom the
the ship.
leather sack containing the twelve seed-pearls
“It is Perrot, the French trader,” she
and threw them upon the cabin table. She
whispered. “Go below and hide. Even, now he
glanced through the open port-hole at the
may have seen you through his glasses.”
Moonbeam towing in the sluggish wake of the The boy’s face turned white beneath
L’Aiglon and bit her lip. Perrot, the trader, his tan.
laughed loudly. It was a cold, sinister laugh
“He shall not take me alive. Sooner
that seemed to emanate from his flaring hair-
death than the living hell of Cayenne.”
studded nostrils.
The girl took his face between her
“A piker’s bet, mademoiselle,” he
hands.
snarled. “Twelve seed-pearls, value thirty
“Fear
not,
temasere” she said softly.
francs, for your pasty-faced lover. Sacre-bleu,
“He shall not take you at all, dead or living.
enfant, the Government of France will pay me But you must hide swiftly.”
one thousand francs for him, dead or alive.”
Hastily rigging a jury jib-boom with
The girl choked back a sob.
the second oar, she hoisted the remaining jib
“It is all I have,” she murmured faintly.
and the mainsail and bore away to the south.
“M’sieu will have mercy. I will sign a
Storm-beaten and damaged though she was,
contract. Half my earnings for one—nay two
the little Moonbeam staggered bravely on. years to come shall be yours. I have found a With anxious eyes Maina lo watched the new bed where the shell is heavy and pink-brigantine grow larger and larger. Through his
edged, and there are pearls of fine luster.”
glasses Perrot, the trader, had recognized her
Perrot leaned back in his chair and
and was driving the L’Aiglon off her course in leered lewdly upon her. His bleary pig-eyes
an effort to overhaul the Moonbeam. Maina lo lingered with bestial contemplation upon her
set her teeth and prayed for night.
slender, lightly garbed form.
At dark the brigantine was a league
“The thirteenth pearl mademoiselle,”
astern, gaining rapidly. Through the gloom of
he said, smacking his damp lips with an
the tropic night her red and green beam-lights
insinuating leer, “the finest in the world, and I followed the wake of the Moonbeam like the trade. Take it or leave it. A house in Suva, fine two evil eyes of a demon. Crouching at her
silks and nothing to do till tomorrow, as the
oar, the girl resorted to every known trick of
Yankees say.”
seacraft in futile efforts to outmaneuver the
“M’sieu is jesting,” she whispered. “I
Some Pearls and a Swine
9
am still a maid, and poor. There are others
“M’sieu, have a care!” she panted,
more beautiful than I. Have mercy!”
turning upon him with the fury
of outraged
He rose from his chair and took a step
chastity.
toward her. With a look of inexorable
Perrot shrank back, a cunning look in
loathing, Maina lo drew away and turned her
his bloodshot eyes.
back upon him. A hundred feet astern swung
“Tres bien, ma cherie, business before
the Moonbeam at the end of the L’Aiglon’s pleasure, eh, what?”
hawser. Perrot’s eyes followed hers through
Taking a bunch of keys from his
the porthole. Upon the deck two sailors sat
pocket, he mounted the stairs and locked the
Turk-fashion, guarding the hatchway, companionway door from the outside. She smoking their pipes. The girl was hardly heard him descend the poop-ladder and order aware of the trader’s presence. She stood the crew to haul the Moonbeam under the looking out to sea with her arms folded upon
stern quarters.
her breast.
Through the porthole she watched the
A rose-tipped ridge of fleecy clouds
ship’s carpenter fit a new jib-boom in place of framed the young dawn. Her face grew the broken one. The two sailors fell to work radiant. Carved indelibly upon her soul stood
upon the tangled rigging, while others-
the runes of love’s sacrificial message. Her
lowered the supplies over the side. Perrot
sacrifice would atone for the mere carnal sin!
himself descended the rope-ladder and threw
Fragrant and virginal his white rose should
an old suit of clothes upon the deck.
ever rest upon her heart.
“Mademoiselle sends her best
“Eh bien, mademoiselle, time is regards,” he said maliciously.
precious. I am waiting,” Perrot growled.
The boy steadied himself against the
“I accept,” the girl answered in a mast and looked at the bundle blankly.
barely audible voice.
“Monsieur had better go below and