Louis Becke - Tessa

A small, squat and dirty-looking trading steamer, with the name Motutapu painted in yellow letters on her bows and stern, lay at anchor off the native village of Utiroa on Drummond’s Island in the Equatorial Pacific. She was about 800 tons burden, and her stained and rusty sides made her appear as if she had been out of port for two years instead of scarcely four months.

At this present moment four of her five boats were alongside, each one piled high over the gunwales with bags of copra, which the steam winch was hoisting in as quickly as possible, for night was drawing on and Captain Louis Hendry, who was then ashore, had given orders to the mate, a burly Yorkshireman named Oliver, to be ready to heave up at six o’clock.

The day had been intensely hot and windless, the sea lay sweltering, leaden-hued and misty, and the smoke from the native houses in Utiroa village hung low down amid the groves of coco-palms which encompassed it on three sides.

On the after-deck of the steamer, under the awning, a man was lying on a bed of mats, with a water-bottle and a plate of bananas beside him. Seated cross-legged beside him was a native boy, about fifteen years of age, who kept fanning his master’s face, and driving away the pestering flies. It was easy to see that the man was suffering from fever. His deeply-bronzed cheeks had yellowed and were thin and hollow, and his eyes dull and apathetic. He looked like a man of fifty, though he was in reality not more than thirty-two. Every now and then he drank, then lay back again with a groan of pain. Piled up on the skylight was a heap of rugs and blankets, for use when the violent chilling attack of ague would follow on the burning, bone-racking heat of fever.

Presently the mate, accompanied by the chief engineer, came aft. Both men were very hot and very dirty, and their faces were streaming with perspiration. They sat down on deck-chairs beside the sick man, called to the steward for a bottle of beer, and asked him how he felt.

Carr made a sudden effort and sat up.

“D– bad, Oliver! I have about six hundred and forty-nine pains all over me, and no two of them in the same place. I’ve swilled enough water to float a battleship; and, look here! you must give me some beer: a bottle—two bottles—a gallon—a cask! Beer I will have if I perish like a beast in the field. I can’t drink water like that-it’s as hot as –”

Morrison, the Scotch engineer, smiled. “Don’t swear, Carr. Ye shall have just one long drink of beer. ‘Twill do ye no great harm on such a roasting day as this.”

The steward brought two bottles of lager beer, and Carr eagerly extended his thin, brown hand for the creamy, tempting liquid poured out for him by the mate. He drank it off and then laid down again.

“When are we getting out of this beastly hole, Oliver?” he asked.

“To night, I expect-that is, if the skipper comes aboard fairly sober. He doesn’t often get too much grog aboard, but this island is one of the places where he is bound to get loaded up. The two traders ashore are countrymen of his, I believe, though they call themselves Britishers.”

Carr nodded. “Dutchmen of some kind, eh?”

“Yes, like himself. He’s a Dane, though if you told him so he’d get nasty over it.”

“He’s a nasty brute, anyway,” said Carr wearily. “I don’t like that shifty eye of his. And I think he’s a bit of a sneak.”

“You needn’t think it; you can be sure of it. I’ll prove it to you in a minute,” said the mate. “Both he and that fat beast of a supercargo are a pair of sneaks, and they hate you like poison. What have you done to offend them?”

“Nothing that I know of. But I have always suspected that neither of them are too fond of me. Hendry I consider a low-lived scoundrel. I met his wife and daughters in Sydney a year ago—went to his house with him. They think he’s a perfect saint, and at the time I thought so too, considering he’s been in the island trade for ten years. But I know what he is pretty well by now. He’s not fit to be married to a decent white woman and have children.”

The mate assented. “You’re right, Carr. He’s a double-faced swab, and a thundering hypocrite as well. There’s only one good point about him—he’s a rattling good sailor man. As for Sam Chard, he’s simply a drunken bully. I shall be glad to be quit of this hooker. I’m not a paragon of virtue, but this ship is a bit too rocky for me. Now I will show you what I meant just now when I said I’ll prove that both Hendry and Chard are sneaks, and have their knives into you.”

He disappeared below for a few seconds, and then returned carrying a letter-book.

“Now, Carr, my boy,” he said, seating himself beside the sick trader again, “just cock your ears and listen. This is our esteemed supercargo’s letter-book. I had to go into his cabin yesterday to look for the list of ship’s stores, and I saw this letter-book lying on his table, opened at this particular page. I caught your name, and took the liberty of reading the letter. It is addressed to the owners in Sydney, and is dated May 5, 1889.”

“That was two days after you and the skipper and Chard had the row about those flash Samoan girls coming aboard at Vavau,” put in Morrison, “and he and Chard started to knock the hands about.”

“I remember,” said Carr, as a grim smile flitted across his yellow face; “go on, Oliver.”

The mate began:—

“‘SS. Motutapu . Niafu Harbour,

“‘Vavau, Tonga Islands,

“‘May 5, 1889.

“‘Dear Sirs,—As the barque Metaris leaves to-day for Sydney, I take the opportunity of writing you to report progress of cruise of the Motutapu up to date.’”

Then followed an account of the various trading operations in which the steamer had been engaged from the time she left Sydney up to her arrival at the Friendly Islands. Then—

“‘In pursuance of your instructions, we called at Kabaira Bay, New Britain, to remove Mr. Harvey Carr from there to a more healthy location. We found Mr. Carr’s station in a satisfactory state, and his accounts were correct. But both Captain Hendry and myself are of the opinion that Mr. Carr was on altogether too friendly terms with the manager of the German firm at Blanche Bay, and we believe that your firm’s interest has greatly suffered thereby. He certainly was ill, but we do not think his illness has been caused by fever, of which we could see no traces, but by his availing himself of the too lavish hospitality of the manager of the German firm. He had also, I learnt, become very thick with the Wesleyan missionaries at Port Hunter, and seems to have been continually visiting them under the pretext of getting medical attendance from the Rev. Dr. Bowen, who, as you are well aware, is a determined opponent of your firm in New Britain, and has made several adverse reports upon our manner of trading with the natives to the commander of H.M. ships.’”

“What do you think of that?” inquired the engineer wrathfully, striking his clenched hand upon his knee; “and the fellow is a Scotsman, too.”

Carr laughed. “Don’t get angry, Morrison. He’s one of the wrong sort of Scotsmen. Give me some beer. I’m a drunken beast, aren’t I? Go on, Oliver.”

“‘In fact Mr. Carr seems to have thoroughly ingratiated himself with the missionaries as well as with the Germans, and I think it is my duty to mention this to you at the earliest opportunity. I proposed to him that he should take charge of one of your stations in the New Hebrides, but he declined to remain in Melanesia, alleging that he is suffering from fever, and insisting on being given a station in the Caroline Islands.