poetry’s legitimate child—music’s fairyland—a civilized old man of the sea—a clerical hat is the symbol of modern religion.
had it not been for men like d—— and many other striking personalities who enlivened the organization, we should have cleared out of it sooner than we did. we were considerably in debt to the host of that sailors’ home, too. there were no certified bailiffs in the south seas, but if one’s account was overdue, credit was taken out of the debtor in a novel manner. bones discovered that one of his customers owed him about fifty dollars for board.
“goying ter pye up?” said he laconically.
“hain’t gotter cent ter bless meself with till i gets an adwance note,” replied the stranded one. there was no further parley on the subject. bones simply caught the culprit by the scruff of the neck, placed one knee in the middle of his back, and then, crash! sent the unfortunate devil through the south sea bankruptcy court at the end of his boot—right through the open door—bang! on to the sward. and the discharged bankrupt, out of debt, went his way, unworried, free from all his late liabilities. once or twice there was a fight when the members took sides on behalf of someone who could not pay his way; hats, rum mugs, and tin pots would fly about, but it was soon all over. they would bind up each other’s wounds, shake hands all round, and end up in a tremendous drinking bout. sometimes highly-cultured men would step out of the great unknown into 319that shanty’s door—actors, musicians, poets, and sad-looking literary men, who would imbibe rum and prove highly entertaining. some had fine voices, others recited hamlet, or made the place hum with laughter ere they drank up, clinked their glass in some toast, and then, to the cry of “god speed,” once more departed out into the great unknown.
o’hara and i would go wandering through the forests, visiting the various tribal villages by the coffee plantations. on these wanderings we were accompanied by our faithful little bodyguard, soogy, a little native half-caste boy. he was a mystical little beggar, not only in his ways but in his origin. no one knew where he came from.
“you no father? no mother, soogy?”
he shook his curly head and said: “no; me come down, dropper from sky!”
he had beautiful eyes, and by the paleness of his complexion one easily concluded that he had european blood in his veins. he was about eight years old. whenever i played the violin he would at once put his little chin on his knees and commence singing. even g——, who had had a lot to do with native youngsters, said that soogy was a wonder. i had no doubt at all that the child was a genius. his mother must have lived in a cave within sound of the seas just before he was born, for music was alive in his soul. his brain was splashed over with moonlight, there was no doubt about that.
“where did you learn that melody, soogy?” i’d say, when he suddenly burst forth and sang some sweet strain with a lingering, haunting note of sadness running through it. he would simply look up, shake his curly head, and wonder what i meant by asking him where his little brain learned its own mysterious music from.
“looks older than he is,” said o’hara. “got eyes 320like a blessed girl,” my pal continued, as soogy fondled my hand and stared up into my face, a weird look in his pretty eyes. i could not make it out; but when that kiddie came up to me in the forest, or crept into my hut-room, an old broken-down shack near the river, the world would change, the sun shine with a mysterious shadowy light, a kind of poetic atmosphere pervading the deep gloom of the woods. i was not surprised when o’hara said:
“begorra, pal, i wish that kiddie would keep away; he’s like some little beggar of a ghost hanging around. i’m sure he’ll bring us bad luck.”
“don’t be a fool. how can a little child influence our ways or alter what must happen to-morrow?” i replied, as the child noticed the angry look in my comrade’s eyes, and looked up to see if i too wanted him to go away.
i didn’t send him away, though. to tell the truth, i came under the mystic spell of that weird child of the forest. sometimes i’d go out of earshot of all the world, accompanied by that mysterious little beggar, and, under the banyans by the lagoon, as fireflies danced in the bamboos, i’d play the violin while he danced. even the cockatoos, as they cried out, “ka ka—ka to wooh! ka! ka! ka! to wooh!” seemed to have come under the influence of soogy’s songs. somehow, the thought of the world beyond the solitude of that forest seemed to fall away; i would half imagine that soogy and i sat side by side in some mossy fairy-wood of a world far beyond the stars. we would seem to be two mighty maestros of heathenland, both of us enthroned on the highest pinnacles of fame as i sat there, that weird little kiddie singing wondrous melodies and dancing. it was nothing strange to me when the old-man-frog looked out of the moonlit marsh flowers in surprise, opened its 321weird-slit mouth, and chanted a wonderful accompaniment in perfect tempo as soogy danced. then some strange thing with a green, semi-human face would peep out of the vatu weeds and clang its tiny cymbals.
knowing that the commonplace conception of reality does not exist at all, and that we mortals only see a nose, a mouth, a glance of the eyes—indeed, the universe itself—in the relation that it assumes by contact with one’s inner self, i felt no wonder as soogy danced beneath the moonlit palms, no soogy at all, but a something weirdly beautiful dancing as i played the violin in the shadowland of my own mad eyes, a something that looked to me like two fallen stars fixed in a wonderful little receptacle called a skull poised on swaying, dusky limbs, and possessing a sweet-voiced tongue.
the very forest trees became etherealized to my eyes as their big heads moved and sighed to the soughing night winds, humming out half-forgotten memories of cherished things. and when those old trees tenderly waved their arms over the weird child, then took partners, and commenced to waltz slowly, i didn’t wonder much; i still played on, wailing forth the magical melodies that soogy sang to my listening ears. it was clear enough that the child had never been taught dancing in any mortal school, for, as his small limbs moved in rhythmical motion, they swerved not one bit from the tempo of the swaying forest flowers as the shifting fingers of the zephyrs tossed them gently one way, and then softly the other way. and my chagrin was complete when i realized that my cultured ear served only to empower me with discernment enough to know that, as a conductor of the most subtle movements in that great orchestra of the forest-night and mighty, waltzing trees, i was simply nowhere where that conductor, an old-man-frog, was concerned, as, with his wonderful clappers 322going “click-er-tee-clack! currh! currh! clack-er to-clack,” he got the most marvellous, subtle musical effects from that wonderful ensemble. the pathos of the tiny streamlet’s voice as it hurried by us, then ran with fright under the forest trees and leapt into the sea, convinced me that i was beautifully mad—as mad as i am now deadly sane. it may have been some inherited madness, or possibly soogy had some magnetic influence over me. i know not which it was. but i do know that, sometimes when i lay half asleep under the ndrala trees of the moonlit forest, he would sit singing wonderful songs for my half-sleeping ears—songs that would seem to drift my life across into unremembered ages till i became one with the stars and the music of the infinite. the very caves along the shore of my bedroom floor seemed to sing out some old sorrow as he came, night after night, creeping out of the forest like some little phantom child, to make my mossy bed!
such a one was soogy. i never dreamed that such sorrow could come to one through knowing a little child—sorrow that made my heart ache for many a day. the whole trouble came about through an old man suddenly arriving at the organization just when o’hara and i had determined to get a ship and clear out for nuka hiva. we were both tired out, had been sauntering about amongst the villages, and were glad enough to get back to the organization’s hospitable roof; but, just as we were approaching the door, we heard a terrible row in progress. it appeared that someone had robbed the aforesaid old man of his valuable pocketbook. there he stood, by the wide-open door, waving his hands in despair, shouting out:
“i’ll give a hundred pounds to the one who finds my pocketbook.”
he was a strange-looking old fellow. he wore a 323clerical hat, a stiff, high collar, and grey side-whiskers; and he was purple to the forehead as he stood there just beneath the low-roof saloon, shouting:
“where’s my pocketbook?”
o’hara and i stared with astonishment to see that old gent, so fashionably attired, a bullet hole in his hat, standing up for himself, defiantly facing the whole damned crew of sun-tanned, villainous-looking men as they thrust their faces, chins, and fists out of the door, and looked scornfully at the grand old man! suddenly tanner bolt, who had his nose missing and had a face like a diseased chinaman, stepped forward and knocked the old fellow’s hat off. o’hara and i, not liking such a cowardly act, immediately sided with the new-comer, who had sought protection from justice in that forest hermitage. bones regarded o’hara and me rather fiercely for a moment, then, whipping his revolver out, turned to the men and roared:
“i’ll shoot the first god-damned rogue who touches any of ’em.”
then the hullabaloo subsided. after that o’hara and i made tracks outside, as g—— went in to have his nap on the saloon settee. the old gent followed us outside.
“a lot of rogues and thieves, that’s what they are,” he almost squeaked, as he shook his fist at the half-hidden den, his false teeth dropping on the sward, so violent was his rage as he shook from head to feet.
“do you chaps belong to them?” said he, as he surveyed us critically.
“no, thank you!”
the emphatic note of my reply seemed to change the old man’s manner immediately, and make him glad to give that confidence that so relieves mortals when they have the world against them.
324“a man enticed me up here from s——, telling me that i could wait here in comfort till the ’frisco boat arrived at s——. i want to get to san francisco; got business there,” he hurriedly added, as he readjusted his pince-nez.
it was a bit of an effort for us to keep serious-looking and hide the fact that we well knew that ’frisco was the much-sought high road to the no-extradition ports.
“get me out of this hole and i’ll give you a present of fifty pounds,” said the old fellow, as he gripped my hand and peered about in a neurotic manner.
o’hara and i looked into one another’s eyes. “fifty pounds!” i heard o’hara’s soul gasp as mine re-echoed it. we had been on long voyages, working like slaves for a mere pittance too!
“don’t say a word to anyone. i can get you away from here safely,” said o’hara, giving him a quiet wink as bones came out of the organization door.
“here’s yer d—— pocketbook,” said he, as he threw something in the direction of the old gent.
that aged, fugitive bank-manager nearly fell forward on to his knees in thanksgiving when he opened the pocketbook and discovered his papers intact.
as soogy came rushing out of the forest and commenced to gambol by us, bones called the old man, took him under the breadfruits, and whispered to him. we saw the old gent take bones’ hand impulsively in his own and vigorously shake it. bones had some sense of honour, and i have no doubt that he had told the new-comer that he would see that he was not molested by the members of the shanty again.
it was wonderful how everything quieted down after that bit of excitement. the old gent imbibed a considerable amount of whisky, told the guilty men that he forgave them, shook their hands across the long benchtable, 325and drank their health. the humour of it all even struck those seasoned criminals. i saw them grin from ear to ear. it was a sight to see those rows of fierce, bearded faces as they sat there, clad in their red shirts and belted pants, the whole scene dimly lit up by the swinging candles that hung in the empty gin bottles just overhead, every sinful eye alert as the old man shook his finger.
that old gent’s main weakness was whisky and rum. most probably it was the main cause of his taking the desperate chance that brought him as a fugitive from justice across the seas. he sang a song to those rough men; his voice was strangely mellow and sweet, becoming pathetic as the fumes got thicker in his sinful head—who knows what thoughts flashed through his drunken dreams?
tanner bolt, lively humper, and jimmy scratch played their mouth-organs and banjos as the wild chorus of those men shook the shanty. then soogy came in and did a dance on the table. i noticed that even those drunken men seemed to come under the spell of that kid’s song and dance. as for the old gent, he kept taking out his watch, keying it up, and staring with his mouth open as he watched the child’s bright eyes and his wonderful dancing. i think the old man was trying to recall his senses, wondering who he was, what he was doing there with those wild-looking men as they encored that mysterious child. then his besotted head fell forward and he dropped off asleep. and when i think of all that happened through him, how the innocent were punished for the sins of the guilty, i wish that he had never awakened again. but there, i mustn’t be too hard on him; he never made himself, and he suffered too.
