ВMONA; THE CHILD; AND THE BEAST
By Louis Becke




ВMONA; THE CHILD; AND THE BEAST

Plus THE SNAKE AND THE BELL and SOUTH SEA NOTES

From "The Strange Adventure Of James Shervinton and Other Stories"

By Louis Becke

T. FISHER UNWIN, 1902

LONDON




ВMONA; THE CHILD; AND THE BEAST'


Вmona was, as his master so frequently told him--accentuating the remark
with a blow or a kick--only "a miserable kanaka." Of his miserableness
there was no doubt, for Denison, who lived in the same house as he did,
was a daily witness of it--and his happiness. Also, he was a kanaka--a
native of Niuй, in the South Pacific; Savage Island it is called by the
traders and is named on the charts, though its five thousand sturdy,
brown-skinned inhabitants have been civilised, Christianised, and have
lived fairly cleanly for the past thirty years.

Вmona and Denison had the distinction of being employed by Armitage, one
of the most unmitigated blackguards in the Pacific. He was a shipowner,
planter, merchant, and speculator; was looked upon by a good many people
as "not a bad sort of a fellow, you know--and the soul of hospitality."
In addition, he was an incorrigible drunken bully, and broke his wife's
heart within four years after she married him. Вmona was his cook.
Denison was one of his supercargoes, and (when a long boat of
drunkenness made him see weird visions of impossible creatures) manager
of the business on shore, overseer, accountant, and Jack-of-all-trades.
How he managed to stay on with such a brute I don't know. He certainly
paid him well enough, but he (Denison) could have got another berth from
other people in Samoa, Fiji, or Tonga had he wanted it. And, although
Armitage was always painfully civil to Denison--who tried to keep
his business from going to the dogs--the man hated him as much as he
despised Вmona, and would have liked to have kicked him, as he would
have liked to have kicked or strangled any one who knew the secret of
his wife's death and his child's lameness. And three people in Samoa did
know it--Вmona, the Niuй cook, Dr. Eckhardt, and Denison. Armitage has
been dead now these five-and-twenty years--died, as he deserved to
die, alone and friendless in an Australian bush hospital out in the
God-forsaken Never-Never country, and when Denison heard of his death,
he looked at the gentle wife's dim, faded photograph, and wondered if
the Beast saw her sweet, sad face in his dying moments. He trusted
not; for in her eyes would have shown only the holy light of love
and forgiveness--things which a man like Armitage could not have
understood--even then.

She had been married three years when she came with him to Samoa to live
on Solo-Solo Plantation, in a great white-painted bungalow, standing
amid a grove of breadfruit and coco-palms, and overlooking the sea
to the north, east, and west; to the south was the dark green of the
mountain-forest.

"Oh! I think it is the fairest, sweetest picture in the world," she said
to Denison the first time he met her. She was sitting on the verandah
with her son in her lap, and as she spoke she pressed her lips to his
soft little cheek and caressed the tiny hands. "So different from where
I was born and lived all my life--on the doll, sun-baked plains of the
Riverina--isn't it, my pet?"

"I am glad that you like the place, Mrs. Armitage," the supercargo said
as he looked at the young, girlish face and thought that she, too, with
her baby, made a fair, sweet picture. How she loved the child! And how
the soft, grey-blue eyes would lose their sadness when the little one
turned its face up to hers and smiled! How came it, he wondered, that
such a tender, flower-like woman was mated to such a man as Armitage!

Long after she was dead, Denison heard the story--one common enough.
Her father, whose station adjoined that of Armitage, got into financial
difficulties, went to Armitage for help, and practically sold his
daughter to the Beast for a couple of thousand pounds. Very likely such
a man would have sold his daughter's mother as well if he wanted money.

* * * * *

As they sat talking, Armitage rode up, half-drunk as usual. He was a big
man, good-looking.

"Hallo, Nell! Pawing the damned kid as usual! Why the hell don't you let
one of the girls take the little animal and let him tumble about on the
grass? You're spoiling the child--by God, you are."

"Ah, he's so happy, Fred, here with me, and----"

"Happy be damned--you're always letting him maul you about. I want a
whisky-and-soda, and so does Denison--don't you?" And then the Beast, as
soon as his wife with the child in her arms had left the room, began
to tell his subordinate of a "new" girl he had met that morning in Joe
D'Acosta's saloon.

"Oh, shut up, man. Your wife is in the next room."

"Let her hear--and be damned to her! She knows what I do. I don't
disguise anything from her. I'm not a sneak in that way. By God, I'm not
the man to lose any fun from sentimental reasons. Have you seen this
new girl at Joe's? She's a Manhiki half-caste. God, man! She's glorious,
simply glorious!"

"You mean Laea, I suppose. She's a common beacher--sailor man's trull.
Surely you wouldn't be seen ever speaking to _her?_"

"Wouldn't I! You don't know me yet! I like the girl, and I've fixed
things up with her. She's coming here as my nursemaid--twenty dollars a
month! What do you think of that?"

"You would not insult your wife so horribly!"

He looked at Denison sullenly, but made no answer, as the supercargo
went on:

"You'll get the dead cut from every white man in Samoa. Not a soul will
put foot inside your store door, and Joe D'Acosta himself would refuse
to sell you a drink! Might as well shoot yourself at once."

"Oh, well, damn it all, don't keep on preaching. I--I was more in fun
than anything else. Ha! Here's Вmona with the drinks. Why don't you be a
bit smarter, you damned frizzy-haired man-eater?"

Amona's sallow face flushed deeply, but he made no reply to the insult
as he handed a glass to his master.

"Put the tray down there, confound you! Don't stand there like a
blarsted mummy; clear out till we want you again."

The native made no answer, bent his head in silence, and stepped quietly
away. Then Armitage began to grumble at him as a "useless swine."

"Why," said Denison, "Mrs. Armitage was only just telling me that he's
worth all the rest of the servants put together. And, by Jove, he _is_
fond of your youngster--simply worships the little chap."

Armitage snorted, and turned his lips down. Ten minutes later, he was
asleep in his chair.

*****

Nearly six months had passed--six months of wretchedness to the young
wife, whose heart was slowly breaking under the strain of living with
the Beast. Such happiness as was hers lay in the companionship of her
little son, and every evening Tom Denison would see her watching the
child and the patient, faithful Вmona, as the two played together on the
smooth lawn in front of the sitting-room, or ran races in and out among
the mango-trees. She was becoming paler and thinner every day--the Beast
was getting fatter and coarser, and more brutalised. Sometimes he would
remain in Apia for a week, returning home either boisterously drunk or
sullen and scowling-faced. In the latter case, he would come into the
office where Denison worked (he had left the schooner of which he was
supercargo, and was now "overseering" Solo-Solo) and try to grasp the
muddled condition of his financial affairs. Then, with much variegated
language, he would stride away, cursing the servants and the place
and everything in general, mount his horse, and ride off again to the
society of the loafers, gamblers, and flaunting unfortunates who haunted
the drinking saloons of Apia and Matafele.

One day came a crisis. Denison was rigging a tackle to haul a tree-trunk
into position in the plantation saw-pit, when Armitage rode up to the
house. He dismounted and went inside. Five minutes later Amona came
staggering down the path to him. His left cheek was cut to the bone by
a blow from Armitage's fist. Denison brought him into his own room,
stitched up the wound, and gave him a glass of grog, and told him to
light his pipe and rest.

"Аmona, you're a _valea_ (fool). Why don't you leave this place? This
man will kill you some day. How many beatings has he given you?" He
spoke in English.

"I know not how many. But it is God's will. And if the master some day
killeth me, it is well. And yet, but for some things, I would use my
knife on him."

"What things?"

He came over to the supercargo, and, seating himself cross-legged on the
floor, placed his firm, brown, right hand on the white man's knee.

"For two things, good friend. The little fingers of the child are
clasped tightly around my heart, and when his father striketh me and
calls me a filthy man-eater, a dog, and a pig, I know no pain. That is
one thing. And the other thing is this--the child's mother hath come to
me when my body hath ached from the father's blows, and the blood hath
covered my face; and she hath bound up my wounds and wept silent tears,
and together have we knelt and called upon God to turn his heart from
the grog and the foul women, and to take away from her and the child the
bitterness of these things."

"You're a good fellow, Вmona," said Denison, as he saw that the man's
cheeks were wet with tears.

"Nay, for sometimes my heart is bitter with anger. But God is good to
me. For the child loveth me. And the mother is of God... aye, and she
will be with Him soon." Then he rose to his knees suddenly, and looked
wistfully at the supercargo, as he put his hand on his. "She will be
dead before the next moon is _ai aiga_ (in the first quarter), for at
night I lie outside her door, and but three nights ago she cried out to
me: 'Come, Amona, Come!' And I went in, and she was sitting up on
her bed and blood was running from her mouth. But she bade me tell no
one--not even thee. And it was then she told me that death was near
to her, for she hath a disease whose roots lie in her chest, and
which eateth away her strength. Dear friend, let me tell thee of some
things... This man is a devil.... I know he but desires to see her die.
He hath cursed her before me, and twice have I seen him take the child
from her arms, and, setting him on the floor to weep in terror, take his
wife by the hand----"

"Stop, man; stop! That'll do. Say no more! The beast!"

"_E tonu, e tonu_ (true, true)," said the man, quietly, and still
speaking in Samoan. "He is as a beast of the mountains, as a tiger of
the country India, which devoureth the lamb and the kid.... And so now I
have opened my heart to thee of these things----"

A native woman rushed into the room: "Come, Вmona, come. _Misi Fafine_
(the mistress) bleeds from her mouth again."

The white man and the brown ran into the front sitting-room together,
just as they heard a piercing shriek of terror from the child; then came
the sound of a heavy fall.

As they entered, Armitage strode out, jolting against them as he passed.
His face was swollen and ugly with passion--bad to look at.

"Go and pick up the child, you frizzy-haired pig!" he muttered hoarsely
to Amona as he passed. "He fell off his mother's lap."

Mrs. Armitage was leaning back in her chair, as white as death, and
trying to speak, as with one hand she tried to stanch the rush of blood
from her mouth, and with the other pointed to her child, who was lying
on his face under a table, motionless and unconscious.

In less than ten minutes, a native was galloping through the bush to
Apia for Dr. Eckhardt. Denison had picked up the child, who, as he came
to, began to cry. Assuring his mother that he was not much hurt, he
brought him to her, and sat beside the lounge on which she lay, holding
him in his arms. He was a good little man, and did not try to talk
to her when the supercargo whispered to him to keep silent, but lay
stroking the poor mother's thin white hand. Yet every now and then, as
he moved or Denison changed his position, he would utter a cry of pain
and say his leg pained him.

Four hours later the German doctor arrived. Mrs. Armitage was asleep; so
Eckhardt would not awaken her at the time. The boy, however, had slept
but fitfully, and every now and then awakened with a sob of pain.
The nurse stripped him, and Eckhardt soon found out what was wrong--a
serious injury to the left hip.

Late in the evening, as the big yellow-bearded German doctor and Denison
sat in the dining room smoking and talking, Taloi, the child's nurse
entered, and was followed by Amona, and the woman told them the whole
story.

"_Misi Fafine_ was sitting in a chair with the boy on her lap when the
master came in. His eyes were black and fierce with anger, and, stepping
up, he seized the child by the arm, and bade him get down. Then the
little one screamed in terror, and _Misi Fafine_ screamed too, and the
master became as mad, for he tore the boy from his mother's arms, and
tossed him across the room against the wall. That is all I know of this
thing."

Denison saw nothing of Armitage till six o'clock on the following
morning, just as Eckhardt was going away. He put out his hand, Eckhardt
put his own behind his back, and, in a few blunt words, told the Beast
what he thought of him.

"And if this was a civilised country," he added crisply, "you would be
now in gaol. Yes, in prison. You have as good as killed your wife
by your brutality--she will not live another two months. You have so
injured your child's hip that he may be a cripple for life. You are a
damned scoundrel, no better than the lowest ruffian of a city slum, and
if you show yourself in Joe D'Acosta's smoking-room again, you'll find
more than half a dozen men--Englishmen, Americans and Germans--ready to
kick you out into the _au ala_" (road).

Armitage was no coward. He sprang forward with an oath, but Denison, who
was a third less of his employer's weight, deftly put out his right foot
and the master of Solo Solo plantation went down. Then the supercargo
sat on him and, having a fine command of seafaring expletives,
threatened to gouge his eyes out if he did not keep quiet.

"You go on, doctor," he said cheerfully. "I'll let you know in the
course of an hour or two how Mrs. Armitage and the boy are progressing.
The seat which I am now occupying, though not a very honourable one,
considering the material of which it is composed, is very comfortable
for the time being; and"--he turned and glared savagely at Armitage's
purpled face--"You sweep! I have a great inclination to let Eckhardt
come and boot the life out of you whilst I hold you down, you brute!"

"I'll kill you for this," said Armitage hoarsely.

"Won't give you the chance, my boy. And if you don't promise to go to
your room quietly, I'll call in the native servants, sling you up like
the pig you are to a pole, and have you carried into Apia, where you
stand a good show of being lynched. I've had enough of you. Every
one--except your blackguardly acquaintances in Matafele--would be glad
to hear that you were dead, and your wife and child freed from you."

Eckhardt stepped forward. "Let him up, Mr. Denison."

The supercargo obeyed the request.

"Just as you please, doctor. But I think that he ought to be put in
irons, or a strait-jacket, or knocked on the head as a useless beast. If
it were not for Mrs. Armitage and her little son, I would like to kill
the sweep. His treatment of that poor fellow Amona, who is so devoted to
the child, has been most atrocious."

Eckhardt grasped the supercargo's hand as Armitage shambled off "He's a
brute, as you say, Mr. Denison. But she has some affection for him. For
myself, I would like to put a bullet through him."

Within three months Mrs. Armitage was dead, and a fresh martrydom began
for poor Amona. But he and the child had plenty of good friends; and
then, one day, when Armitage awakened to sanity after a long drinking
bout, he found that both Amona and the child had gone.

Nearly a score of years later Denison met them in an Australian city.
The "baby" had grown to be a well-set-up young fellow, and Amona the
faithful was still with him--Amona with a smiling, happy face. They came
down on board Denison's vessel with him, and "the baby" gave him, ere
they parted, that faded photograph of his dead mother.






THE SNAKE AND THE BELL

When I was a child of eight years of age, a curious incident occurred in
the house in which our family lived. The locality was Mosman's Bay, one
of the many picturesque indentations of the beautiful harbour of Sydney.
In those days the houses were few and far apart, and our own dwelling
was surrounded on all sides by the usual monotonous-hued Australian
forest of iron barks and spotted gums, traversed here and there by
tracks seldom used, as the house was far back from the main road,
leading from the suburb of St. Leonards to Middle Harbour. The building
itself was in the form of a quadrangle enclosing a courtyard, on to
which nearly all the rooms opened; each room having a bell over the
door, the wires running all round the square, while the front-door bell,
which was an extra large affair, hung in the hall, the "pull" being one
of the old-fashioned kind, an iron sliding-rod suspended from the outer
wall plate, where it connected with the wire.

One cold and windy evening about eight o'clock, my mother, my sisters,
and myself were sitting in the dining-room awaiting the arrival of my
brothers from Sydney--they attended school there, and rowed or sailed
the six miles to and fro every day, generally returning home by dusk. On
this particular evening, however, they were late, on account of the wind
blowing rather freshly from the north-east; but presently we heard the
front-door bell ring gently.

"Here they are at last," said my mother; "but how silly of them to go to
the front door on such a windy night, tormenting boys!"

Julia, the servant, candle in hand, went along the lengthy passage,
and opened the door. No one was there! She came back to the dining-room
smiling--"Masther Edward is afther playin' wan av his thricks,
ma'am----" she began, when the bell again rang--this time vigorously. My
eldest sister threw down the book she was reading, and with an impatient
exclamation herself went to the door, opened it quickly, and said
sharply as she pulled it inwards--

"Come in at once, you stupid things!" There was no answer, and she
stepped outside on the verandah. No one was visible, and again the big
bell in the hall rang!

She shut the door angrily and returned to her seat, just as the bell
gave a curious, faint tinkle as if the tongue had been moved ever so
gently.

"Don't take any notice of them," said my mother, "they will soon get
tired of playing such silly pranks, and be eager for their supper."

Presently the bell gave out three clear strokes. We looked at each
other and smiled. Five minutes passed, and then came eight or ten gentle
strokes in quick succession.

"Let us catch them," said my mother, rising, and holding her finger
up to us to preserve silence, as she stepped softly along the hall, we
following on tiptoe.

Softly turning the handle, she suddenly threw the door wide open, just
as the bell gave another jangle. Not a soul was visible!

My mother--one of the most placid-tempered women who ever breathed, now
became annoyed, and stepping out on the verandah, addressed herself to
the darkness--

"Come inside at once, boys, or I shall be very angry. I know perfectly
well what you have done; you have tied a string to the bell wires, and
are pulling it. If you don't desist you shall have no supper."

No answer--except from the hall bell, which gave another half-hearted
tinkle.

"Bring a candle and the step-ladder, Julia," said our now thoroughly
exasperated parent, "and we shall see what these foolish boys have done
to the bell-wire."

Julia brought the ladder; my eldest sister mounted it, and began to
examine the bell. She could see nothing unusual, no string or wire, and
as she descended, the