Page:Rolf Boldrewood - A Modern Buccaneer.djvu/25

 There was some wahines in it, in coorse—that's whats they call the women in thim parts. Somehow or other I got a knock on the head, and remimbered nothing more until I woke up in the 'Calaboose,' where I was charged with batin' a native till he was nigh dead. To make a long story short, I got six months 'hard.' and the ship sailed away without me.

"When I'd served my time, I walks into the American Consulate and asks for a passage to California.

Clear out,' says the Consul, 'you red-headed varmint, I have nothing to say to you, after beating an inoffensive native in the manner you did.'

By the powers,' says I to myself, 'you're a big blackguard, Dan Daly, when you've had a taste of liquor, but if I remimber batin' any man black, white, or whitey-brown, may I be keel-hauled. Howsomdever, that says nothing, the next thing's a new ship.'

"So I steps down to the wharf and aboord a smart-looking schooner that belonged to Carl Brander, a big merchant in Tahiti, as rich as the Emperor of China, they used to say. The mate was aboord. 'Do you want any hands?' says I.

We do,' says he. 'You've a taking colour of hair for this trade, my lad.'

" 'How's that?'

Why, the girls down at Rimitara and Rurutu will just make love to you in a body. Red hair's the making of a man in thim parts.'

"Upon this I signed articles for six months in the schooner, and next day we sailed for a place called Bora-bora in the north-west. We didn't stay there long, but got under weigh for Rurutu next day. We weren't hardly clear of Bora-bora when we sights a brigantine away to windward and bearing down on us before the wind. As soon as she got close enough, she signalled that she wanted to send a boat aboard, so we hove to and waited.