the dawn rose up on the shoulder of a southeast wind, warm, steady, and breezing the gold of the lagoon water.
gulls flew about the schooner on board of which dick and aioma had slept so as to be ready for an early start.
now could be heard aioma’s voice calling up the hands from the foc’sle and now katafa, watching from the shore, could hear the sound of the winch heaving the anchor chain short.
poni, who had been chief man under sru, knew all the moves in the game. he watched the mainsail set and the fore, the gaskets taken off the jib; talking to aioma and explaining things, he waited till the canvas was set and then gave the order for the anchor to be got in.
le moan watched as poni, taking the wheel, let the mainsail fill to the wind that was coming nearly dead from the south, whilst the schooner, moving slowly against the trickle of the ebb, crept up on the village and then turning south in a great curve made for the break on the port tack.
le moan could see katafa far away on the shore backed by the trees of the village, a tiny figure that grew less and less and less as the gates of morning widened before them and the thunder of the billows loudened.
the sun had lifted above the sea line and the swell and the wind whipped the spray across the coral of the southern pier whilst aioma, hypnotized, half terrified, yet showing nothing of it all stood, his dream realized at last.
oh, but the heart clutch when she heeled to starboard and he recognized that there was no outrigger to port—for the outrigger is always fastened to the port side of canoes—no outrigger to port for the crew to crawl out on and stabilize her by their weight, and when she heeled to port the terror came lest the outrigger should be run too deep under.
there was no outrigger, he knew it—but, just as in the dream ship, he could not get rid of the obsession of it.
moreover, now that the canvas was raised, now that the wind was bravely filling it, the enormousness of the size of those great sails would have set his teeth chattering had he not clenched his jaws.
to take a ship out of karolin lagoon with the ebb running strong and a south wind, required a cool head and a steady nerve on the part of the steersman. the great lagoon emptying like a bath met the northerly current, the outflowing waters setting up a cross sea. there was also a point where steerage way was lost and it all depended how the ship was set for the opening as to whether she would broach to and be dashed against the coral.
but poni was used to lagoon waters and the schooner safe in his hands came dead for the centre of the opening; then the ebb took her, like an arrow she came past the piers of coral, met the wash of the cross sea, shook herself and then to the thunder of thrashing, cleared the land and headed north.
“she will eat the wind,” aioma had once said, “there will be no more wind left for canoes in all the islands”; and now as poni shifted the helm and the main boom stuttered and then lashed out to port, she was eating the wind indeed, the wind that was coming now almost dead aft. the smashing of the seas against her bows had ceased: with a following swell and a following breeze, silence took them—silence broken only by the creak of timber, block and cordage.
le moan looked back again. almost behind them to the sou’-sou’west karolin lay with the morning splendour on its vast outer beach whose song came faint across the blue sea, on the tall palms bending to the wind, on its gulls for ever fishing.
her eyes trained to great distances could pick out the thicker tree clumps where the houses lay and near the trees on a higher point of coral something that was not coral; the form of a girl, a mote in the sea dazzle now perceived, now gone.
le moan watched till the reef line was swallowed by the shimmer from which the trees rose as if footed in the sea. she had stirred no hand in the whole of this business: her coming on board had been at the direction of aioma, the fate that threw her and taori together even for a few hours whilst separating him from katafa was a thing working beyond and outside her, and yet it came to her that all this was part of the message of the cassi flowers, something that had to be because of her love for taori, something brought into existence by the power of her passion—something that united her for ever with taori.
the mind of le moan had no littleness, it was wanting in many things but feeble in nothing; it was merciless but not cruel, and when the sun of taori shone on it, it showed heights and depths that had only come into being through the shining of that sun. for the sake of taori she had sacrificed herself to peterson, for the sake of taori she had destroyed carlin, for the sake of taori she would sacrifice herself again, she who knew not even the meaning of the word “unselfish” or the meaning of the word “pity.”
she could have killed katafa easily, and in some secret manner—but that would not have brought her taori’s love, and to kill the body of katafa, of what use would that be whilst the image of katafa endured in taori’s mind.
katafa was a midge whose buzzing disturbed her dream, it was passing, it would pass.
she turned to where aioma, who had recovered his assurance and stability of mind, had suddenly flung his arms round dick, embracing him.
there was something of the schoolgirl in this old gentleman’s moments of excitement and expansion, something distinctly feminine in his times of uplift. no longer fearing capsize, free now of the obsession of the outrigger and glorying in the extraordinary and new sensations crowding on him, he remembered the gulls, the reef of marua and his scheme.
“taori,” cried aioma, “the canoes i have built, nay the biggest of them, are to this as the chickens of the great gull to their mother. let the wind follow us till the going down of the sun and we will see marua.”
dick, for the first time, looked back and saw the far treetops of karolin. they seemed a vast distance away.
he thought for the first time of katafa. she had said no word asking him to limit the cruise. aioma had only suggested taking the ship beyond the reef and the provision of water and fruit had only been taken as a precaution against the dangers of the sea. she had dreaded the business but had spoken no word, fearing to spoil his pleasure, and sure that he would risk nothing for the love of her. but she had reckoned without his youth and the daring which god had implanted in the heart of man; she had reckoned without the extraordinary fascination the schooner exercised upon him and of which she knew next to nothing. she had reckoned without aioma.
a thread tying his heart to the distant shore twitched as though at the pull of katafa.
“but marua is far,” said he.
aioma laughed. “the canoes have often gone there,” he replied, “and what are they to this? besides, taori, it is no idle journey i wish to make, for it is in my mind that it was from the reef of marua those gulls came that fought the gulls of karolin, they were seeking a new home. why?”
“the gulls only know,” replied dick, “and then there are the bad men whom some day i mean to slay, but not now, for we have not enough men, not a spear with us.”
“we have the speak sticks of the papalagi,” said aioma, “and i can use them. le moan taught me, but the bad men are out of sight; in this business we need not draw nearer to marua than we are now from karolin, or only a little. it is the reef i wish to see and what may walk on it, for gulls do not leave their home just because the wind blows hard or the sea rises high. they have been driven, taori, and what has driven them—greater gulls, or some new form of man—who knows? but i wish to see.”
dick pondered on this. he had only intended to sail the schooner a short way, to feel her moving on the outer sea, to handle her; with the eating had come the appetite, with the handling of power the desire to use it. he had no fear about getting back, karolin lagoon light would lead them just as it had led him and katafa, and his mind was stirred by what aioma had said about the gulls.
what had happened to drive them away from their home? he had never thought of the matter before in this light, thinking of it now he saw the truth in the words of the other, and having a greater mind than the mind of the canoe-builder, he linked the great waves with the business more definitely than the latter had done.
“aioma,” said he, “the great waves that broke our houses drove the gulls.”
“but the waves,” said aioma, “came before the gulls.”
“but the gulls may have rested on the water and come after,” said dick, “the waves may have broken the reef as it broke our houses.”
“but the reef of karolin was not broken,” said aioma.
“the waves may have been greater at marua,” replied dick, “and have grown smaller with the coming.”
“i had thought of the waves,” said aioma; “well, we will see; if the reef of marua is broken, it is broken; if greater gulls are there, we will see them.”
dick looked back once again. the treetops of karolin so far off now showed only like pins’ heads, but the lagoon glow in the sky was definite; ahead could be seen the north-flowing current. like the kuro shiwo of japan, the haya e amata current to the east of karolin showed a blue deeper than the blue of the surrounding sea; but the kuro shiwo is vast, many miles in breadth, sweeping across the pacific from japan, it comes down the coasts of the americas—a world within a world, a sea within a sea. the haya e amata is small, so narrow that its confines can be seen by the practised eyes of the canoe men, and from the deck of the schooner its marking was clearly visible to the eye that knew how to find it; a sharp yet subtle change of colour where the true sea met its river.
dick could see it as plain as a road. with it for leader and the lagoon light of karolin for beacon, they could not lose their way. then there was le moan, the pathfinder who could bring them back even though the lagoon light vanished from the sky.
the weather was assured.
le moan had taken the wheel from poni, who wanted to go forward. she, who had brought the schooner to karolin was, after aioma and dick, the chief person on board; in a way she was above them, for neither dick nor aioma had yet learned to handle the wheel.
forward, by the galley, stood the rest of the crew and dick’s eyes having ranged over them, turned to aioma.
“yes,” said he, “we will go and see.” he turned to the after rail. the treetops had vanished, the land gulls were gone, but karolin still spoke from the great light in the sky that like a faithful soul remained, above all things, beautiful, assured.
