He managed to get into the chair, where he panted in a state
of collapse. In a few minutes he roused himself. The boy held the end
of the telescope against one of the veranda scantlings, while the man
gazed through it at the sea. At last he picked up the white sails of the
schooner and studied them.
"No _Jessie_," he said very quietly. "That's the _Malakula_."
He changed his seat for a steamer reclining-chair. Three hundred feet
away the sea broke in a small surf upon the beach. To the left he could
see the white line of breakers that marked the bar of the Balesuna River,
and, beyond, the rugged outline of Savo Island. Directly before him,
across the twelve-mile channel, lay Florida Island; and, farther to the
right, dim in the distance, he could make out portions of Malaita--the
savage island, the abode of murder, and robbery, and man-eating--the
place from which his own two hundred plantation hands had been recruited.
Between him and the beach was the cane-grass fence of the compound. The
gate was ajar, and he sent the house-boy to close it. Within the fence
grew a number of lofty cocoanut palms. On either side the path that led
to the gate stood two tall flagstaffs. They were reared on artificial
mounds of earth that were ten feet high.
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