The contraband and stolen property was piled in assorted heaps on the
back veranda of the bungalow. A few paces from the bottom of the steps
were grouped the forty-odd culprits, with behind them, in solid array,
the several hundred blacks of the plantation. At the head of the steps
Joan and Sheldon were seated, while on the steps stood the gang-bosses.
One by one the culprits were called up and examined. Nothing definite
could be extracted from them. They lied transparently, but persistently,
and when caught in one lie explained it away with half a dozen others.
One boy complacently announced that he had found eleven sticks of
dynamite on the beach. Matapuu's revolver, found in the box of one Kapu,
was explained away by that boy as having been given to him by Lervumie.
Lervumie, called forth to testify, said he had got it from Noni; Noni had
got it from Sulefatoi; Sulefatoi from Choka; Choka from Ngava; and Ngava
completed the circle by stating that it had been given to him by Kapu.
Kapu, thus doubly damned, calmly gave full details of how it had been
given to him by Lervumie; and Lervumie, with equal wealth of detail, told
how he had received it from Noni; and from Noni to Sulefatoi it went on
around the circle again.
Divers articles were traced indubitably to the house-boys, each of whom
steadfastly proclaimed his own innocence and cast doubts on his fellows.
Pages:
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236