Beyond the Rim/Chapter 11

HE TRADITIONAL pair of strange bulldogs had little more in common than Tuan Yuck and Sayers aboard the schooner next morning. While the Chinaman showed no outward signs of irritation he was chagrined at the success of Chalmers in cutting off their shore communication.

Sayers openly growled and barked and vowed to get even. His head seemed split apart and the liquor he absorbed increased the aggravation until he vented his ill-temper upon everything in sight, glowering with bloodshot eyes and cursing the Kanakas as they hurried out of the way of his wrath, and finally spilling his spite against the armor of Tuan Yuck's impenetrability.

“A nice mess,” he growled. “The only boat we've got gone to the bottom and hell and all ahead to get it up, if we can do it at all. It's all very well for you to sit there sneering at me like an ivory Buddha in a bazaar. It was no fault of mine! I'll tell you flat to your face that I don't like your attitude, Tuan Yuck, with your 'wiser than thou' smile. I didn't sink the boat, did I? I wasn't to blame for it any more than you, was I? Then don't look so  superior about it, because for two pins I'd change the look on your face and make the change permanent.”

He had advanced his head with its undershot jaw and glaring eyes close to Tuan Yuck's across the cabin table, set with his own untasted breakfast and the Oriental's emptied dishes. Tuan Yuck did not move a muscle, the narrow eyelids were partly closed and behind them the dark eyes sparkled like a snake's, never moving from those of Sayers.

The Australian's bullying speech was mostly braggadocio, spoken not only to relieve his feelings but to reassure himself. He was conscious both of an increasing distrust of Tuan Yuck, and of a certain fear that was gradually growing within him and strengthening a conviction that before the trip was ended the two of them would come to open warfare. This belief was born of his own half-planned determination to possess himself of the Chinaman's share of the pearls—once they obtained them—and an instinctive, prophetic knowledge that Tuan Yuck held the same intent.

It was with a strong effort that he checked his outburst. His nerves were jumping with the reaction of the liquor and he knew that physically he would collapse after one fierce spurt of energy. How much strength there was in Tuan Yuck's frame he did not know; it was the enigma of the man, bodily and mentally, that controlled while it enraged him. Besides there were yet the pearls to gain and the contents of the lagoon to reap. He could not handle the situation single-handed and he could not count upon the natives. How much they were under the Oriental's control he was presently to learn, but he already sensed that any act on his part would range them against him—unless he could catch Tuan Yuck unawares and single-handed—when the time was ripe.

The man's mind was like a stagnant gutter, never flushed, holding all the impurities that came to it and breeding more. The thought of being the possessor of unlimited wealth inflamed his selfishness with plans of debaucheries that included a circuit of the world and an orgy of wine, women and song, a vague mixture of intoxication that was a blend of the satisfaction of the vices one part of him wanted to wallow in, and a revel in the hearing of music and the operas that the remnant of his spiritual consciousness craved.

He reached out a trembling hand to refill his glass and knocked over the square-faced bottle of gin. Tuan Yuck caught it with a swift movement before it spilled and set it upright.

“That's your main trouble, Sayers,” he said quietly, as he set it down. “If we are going to pull together in this thing we both of us need all our wits.”

“What about your dope pills?” sneered Sayers.

“I use opium to quiet my nerves,” said Tuan Yuck evenly, “not to set them on edge. Did you ever notice that it did me any harm?”

Sayers' half-muddled brain caught the logic of the retort. The Chinaman was right. He needed all his wits, not so much for joint action as to remain on even terms with his partner.

“You're right,” he said, hesitating, with the bottle-neck clinking against his tumbler, “but I can't chuck it altogether—not right away.” And he gulped down the liquor.

The hint of a smile passed over Tuan Yuck's countenance and faded.

“I didn't mean to do that,” he said. “I only counseled moderation,” he went on with eyes that mocked the Australian's endeavor to pull himself together. “When I said last night your methods were crude, I meant that you drink too much and forget to eat. You spilled the fat on the fire when you made a grab at those pearls”

“While you were wasting time in words. The thing had to come to a head. What was the use in beating about the bush?”

“If we had promised everything and the girl had come on board, would it have been any harder to have eventually got what we wanted?” asked Tuan Yuck quietly. “Now, we have a fight on our hands and, so far, they have got a little the best of it.”

Sayers looked at him in resentful appreciation.

So that had been Tuan Yuck's plan—to get the girl and the pearls aboard; to let Chalmers navigate until they were close enough to their destination to dispense with his services, and then. …

“You're a better pirate than I am,” he said grudgingly. “Why didn't you tip me off to your scheme?”

Tuan Yuck showed his teeth in a blank smile at the compliment.

“It seemed the obvious move,” he answered. “I imagined you figured it out the same way.”

Sayers pushed back the bottle and started to get up, holding his head in both hands as he did so.

“I've got to cut out the booze,” he muttered.

Tuan Yuck, watching him, chuckled internally. The Oriental was a firm believer in the axiom that lookers-on see most of the game. His policy was to wait until the right moment, and then usurping the board, make the move that left him the ultimate conqueror.

“I can give you something for that headache,” he said. “And presently you can eat something.”

Sayers' bloodshot eyes viewed him suspiciously as he disappeared to his cabin, emerging with a lacquered box in his hand nearly full of greenish-gray tablets. Tuan Yuck placed two in the Australian's half-reluctant palm, and, with a quizzical look, that showed how well he read the other's thoughts, put one into his own mouth.

“The Mongolian equivalent for hasheesh,” he said. “Let it dissolve on your tongue.”

Even as the pastils liquefied, Sayers felt their soothing effect. His head cleared as if by magic, his nerves steadied, and his pulses began to beat with a regularity that soon invigorated him.

“You're a wizard!” he exclaimed. “There's a fortune in those, Tuan Yuck! 'Morning After' tablets. Worth their weight in gold. And you could charge that much for 'em and get away with it.”

“They cost more than that,” Tuan Yuck answered dryly. “And as they are the most insidious of drug composites, they are likely to form a habit that is decidedly expensive and dangerous.”

Sayers looked covetously at the little box.

“It's great stuff,” he said. “I feel fit. Hanged if I haven't got the beginning of an appetite already. If I can get some food into my system presently I'll be in fine shape. Now the first thing to do is to get that boat up. That's going to be some job. I wish I had Chalmers by the neck and could make him do it. We'll have to make Hamaku dive and get a rope on to it. Then we can rig a line at the end of the main gaff and swing the spar out so as to get a fairly up-and-down haul, and snake her up with the capstan. We can do that as we lie without getting up anchor, and making sail on this flood-tide and trying to moor dead over the boat.”

Tuan Yuck eyed him curiously.

“How good a sailor are you, Sayers?” he asked.

“Good enough to handle this schooner in everything outside of navigation,” he boasted, feeling the increasing exhilaration of the drugs he had swallowed. “I can sail her as close as Chalmers any day in the week.”

“Ah! You could make Nameless Isle at a pinch?”

“That's easy. Or to the Solomons for that matter. Just sail sou'west. You couldn't miss 'em. If the winds were steady I could come close to sailing all the way back, following up the course Chalmers laid out coming down. Yes—sir. Oh, Hamaku!” he called up the companionway. “You can handle him better than I can,” he said to Tuan Yuck. “Tell him what we want.”

Tuan Yuck explained, talking Hawaiian fluently, as did Sayers. Hamaku shook his head.

“I am no diver,” he said. “I could not swim down to six fathoms with a rope and fasten it. My lungs are not big enough. And there is no height from which to dive.”

“You can carry weights,” said Sayers. “Put the line under your arms, Hamaku. You can take the chicken-coop or a grating for a raft, and paddle it out over the boat.”

The Kanaka continued to protest. Both he and his fellow were still cowed by the storm, and the second win of Chalmers in sinking the boat. It was their disposition to always be with the victors.

“I am no diver,” he repeated sullenly.

“Hamaku!” Tuan Yuck's voice held a vibrant note of command. Hamaku shifted on his feet, his head hanging.

“Look at me!” commanded the Chinaman sharply.

The silky tone sounded like the snap of a whiplash. The native lifted his eyes with evident reluctance, caught the challenge of the gaze that held his own and mastered it while the stronger spirit of the Oriental took possession of the Hawaiian's. For a moment Hamaku's will resisted, then his dwindling protests of ''“Aole! Aole!'' (No! No!) stopped in midbreath, and he stood like a well trained servant waiting for orders, as impassive as his master.

It was the first time Sayers had witnessed a demonstration of Tuan Yuck's control of the natives. It was the first time he had ever seen hypnosis at close range, and he was inclined to be skeptical.

“Will he do anything you tell him to now?” he asked.

“Anything I will tell him to.”

“Going to keep him in the trance while he dives?”

“No. He'll be a better judge of what should be done than I can be. But he thinks I can control him at any minute.”

“Then it's bunkum?”

“Not at all. I'm going to speak aloud what I will him to do, so you can judge for yourself. Tuan Yuck tore a loose leaf from the end of Chalmers's carefully kept log-book and folded it into a narrow strip.

“Pick up this dagger, Hamaku,” he said in a low voice. “You are afraid of Mr. Sayers. This will protect you. You can kill him with it if you hate him enough. See, he is asleep. Now you are not afraid of him any longer. Creep up on him. Be careful. Make no noise. Now! Strike!”

The Australian, with a fascination touched with awe, saw the emotions change on Hamaku's face from fear to convulsed hatred, then to cunning as, clutching the paper, he inched towards him. As the Hawaiian raised his arm for the blow, Sayers, despite himself, threw up his own arm in defense and clutched the descending wrist.

Tuan Yuck shouted a sharp command, and clapped his hands. Animation returned to Hamaku's eyes and confusion left him shamefaced, as Sayers, feeling almost as foolish, let go his wrist, and the mock weapon fluttered down.

“What have I done?” asked the native.

“Nothing. Go and get ready for the dive.”

Hamaku left, cringing as he passed near Tuan Yuck.

“I thought you had to make passes or use something to dazzle them,” said Sayers, trying to affect a nonchalance that he was far from feeling.

“Not always, with a good subject. The stronger will is sufficient. I might have to with you. Shall I try?”

Tuan Yuck's eyes mocked Sayers', as their glances met. The Australian doggedly endured the power that seemed to pour from the Chinaman's darkly glittering orbs until he felt a sudden desire to yield in answer to the imperative statement that rang in his brain in one repeated sentence:

“You are not so strong as I am. You are not so strong as I am.”

He passed his hand across his forehead, summoning all his will to throw off its oppression, and his vision cleared. The room had been gradually filling with a mist out of which shone two points of light. Now he knew that these were Tuan Yuck's eyes, still mocking, and that the mist was the hallucination of his own brain.

“I'm going to rig up that tackle,” he said shortly, rousing himself.

As he went on deck, still conscious of the Oriental's jeering gaze, he resolved to find some way of offsetting the latter's influence over Hamaku and Tomi. The prospect of having a knife stuck between his ribs at the will of Tuan Yuck was not a reassuring

“I've got to go slow on the booze,” he told himself again, “and when I sleep it'll be behind a locked door or a long way from Mr. Yuck. I think I'll stay ashore nights after this, though I suppose I needn't worry till we've got our hands on something worth letting blood over; and then, my worthy Confucian, you'll find more than one can play that game.”