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A minute later, peeping, Mapuhi saw the ghost drinking. When it reached out a shaking hand and laid it on his, he felt the weight of it and was convinced that it was no ghost. Then he emerged, dragging Tefara after him, and in a few minutes all were listening to Nauri's tale.

Past the bust of Bougainville, past the offices of Emile Levy, the pearler whom, to Levy's intense anger, Jack London slew in "The House of Mapuhi"; past the naval depot, the American consulate with the red, white, and blue flung in the breeze; the Commissariat de Police, the pool of Psyche, and all the rows of schooners that line the quays, with their milken sails drying on their masts, and I am by the stores of the merchants.

You heard him yourself ask to see it. I had not told him. He knew. Somebody else told him. And I owed him the money." "Mapuhi is a fool," mimicked Ngakura. She was twelve years old and did not know any better. Mapuhi relieved his feelings by sending her reeling from a box on the ear; while Tefara and Nauri burst into tears and continued to upbraid him after the manner of women.

"Mapuhi is a fool!" was the answering yell, and the next moment they were lost to each other in the descending water. Half an hour later, Huru-Huru, watching from the seaward side of the atoll, saw the two boats hoisted in and the Aorai pointing her nose out to sea.

Mapuhi might well have sold it for fourteen hundred Chili, but that Levy, who knew pearls, should have paid twenty-five thousand francs was too wide a stretch. Raoul decided to interview Captain Lynch on the subject, but when he arrived at that ancient mariner's house, he found him looking wide-eyed at the barometer. "What do you read it?"

He knew that Mapuhi owed Toriki for trade goods advanced the year before. The squall had passed. The hot sun was blazing down, and the lagoon was once more a mirror. But the air was sticky like mucilage, and the weight of it seemed to burden the lungs and make breathing difficult. "Have you heard the news, Toriki?" Huru-Huru asked. "Mapuhi has found a pearl.

"What good will the house do you?" Raoul demanded. "The first hurricane that comes along will wash it away. You ought to know." "Captain Raffy says it looks like a hurricane right now." "Not on Fakarava," said Mapuhi. "The land is much higher there. On this island, yes. Any hurricane can sweep Hikueru. I will have the house on Fakarava. It must be six fathoms long with a porch all around "

Also will he give one thousand French in credit, which is two thousand Chili." "And it will be six fathoms long?" Nauri queried. "Ay," answered Mapuhi, "six fathoms." "And in the middle room will be the octagon-drop-clock?" "Ay, and the round table as well." "Then give me something to eat, for I am hungry," said Nauri, complacently. "And after that we will sleep, for I am weary.

It would come to four thousand French dollars, allowing a margin for safety four thousand French dollars were equivalent to twenty thousand francs. It was impossible. How was he to know the value of such a pearl? Twenty thousand francs was a lot of money and of his mother's money at that. "Mapuhi," he said, "you are a big fool. Set a money price."

When Mapuhi dropped it into his hand he was surprised by the weight of it. That showed that it was a good pearl. He examined it closely, through a pocket magnifying glass. It was without flaw or blemish. The purity of it seemed almost to melt into the atmosphere out of his hand. In the shade it was softly luminous, gleaming like a tender moon.