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He swore at Hatch, and made him take off the irons; he got out a bottle of white rum and forced them all to drink his health; he kept them in a roar with the story of his adventures, and laughed and cried in turn as he described his life ashore. "What does she want?" demanded Brady, as Tehea insistently repeated some words in native.
"Remember," she said with sweet relenting, "that wherever thou goest, however many the years that may divide us, however wide the waters or the land, I shall be here waiting for thee, here in this house of our happiness; and if I die before thou comest here thou wilt find my grave." "Tehea," he said, "as God sees me, some day I shall return!"
Dressed like a native in tapa cloth, with bare chest, and flowers in his tawny hair, the handsome boy was seated in a hammock. With her head against his knee, a beautiful girl was looking up into his face, one hand locked in his. In that land of pretty women she was the one that outshone them all Tehea, the sister of the king, for whose sweet favor every man on board had sought in vain.
Tehea rose, and throwing her arms round his neck and forcing away his hands, pressed her lips to his wet eyes. Even as she did so Brady gave the signal for the whole party to move round to the entrance. He passed through first, the others close behind him. Jack leaped to his feet, white and speechless, his wide-open eyes those of an animal at bay.
He might have landed anywhere and found his way through those tangled, scented paths with no other guide but memory. There was Papaloloa with its roaring falls; there, the ti'a a Peau where he had shot his first goat; yonder, the misty heights of Tiarapu, where Tehea and he had camped a night in the clouds in an air of English cold.
He spread out the chart on his cabin table and sighed as he laid his finger on Borabora. He shut his eyes, and saw the basaltic cliffs, the white and foaming reefs, the green, still forests of that unforgotten island. He was a boy once more, with flowers in his hair, wandering beneath the palms with Tehea.
Her eyes flashed as she freed herself from his arms. "I am hateful in my own sight for having loved you," she said. "Will you not even wish me well, Tehea?" he asked. "No," she cried, "I hope you will die!" He turned away. "Siati!" she cried after him in agony. He turned back to her, downcast and silent.
But they would soon be out again, and it behooved him to make the best use of his solitude while he might. He struck inland, his heart beating with a curious expectancy; at every sound he held his breath, and he would turn quickly and look back with a haunting sense that Tehea was near him; that perhaps she was gazing at him through the trees.
I love her. I shall never see her again. May I not entreat a minute to myself?" "No," said Brady. Jack went over to Tehea and took her hand. He put his arms about her, and, unashamed before them all, pressed her comely head against his breast.
It had never occurred to him before that Tehea might be dead. He held back the undergrowth again and peered into the depths.
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