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THE HAUNTED PAGODAS--THE QUEST OF THE GOLDEN PEARL

By J. E. Hutchinson

Illustrated by Hume Nisbet

London: Ward and Downey

1897

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QUEST OF THE GOLDEN PEARL.




CHAPTER I.--THE SHARK-CHARMER WALKS THE PLANK.


 Jack! I say, Jack! there's a row among the boatmen.”

A sturdy, thick-set young fellow of seventeen was Jack, with low-hung
fists of formidable size, and a love for anything in the shape of a row
that constantly led him into scrapes. Hot-headed though he was, he was
one of the most good-humoured, well-meaning young fellows in the world,
who, while he would not hurt a fly if he could help it, was always ready
to fight in defence of his own or another's rights.

His chum, Roydon Leigh--“Don” for short--was of an altogether different
type of young manhood. Jack's senior by a year, he was tall for his
age, standing five feet ten in his stockings. His lithe, wiry frame
contrasted strongly with Jack's sturdier build, as did his Scotch
“canniness” with that young gentleman's headlong impetuosity.

“A row!” cried Jack delightedly, as he rushed to the taffrail. “Time,
too; four weeks we've lain here, and never a hand in a single shindy!”

His companion laughed.

“As for that,” said he, “you're not likely to have a hand in this,
unless you take the boat and row off to the diving grounds. All the
same, there's a jolly row on--look yonder.”

The schooner _Wellington_ rode at anchor at the northern extremity of
the Strait of Manaar, on the famous pearl-fishing grounds of Ceylon.
On her larboard bow lay the coast--a string of low, white sand-hills,
dotted with the dark-brown thatch of fisher huts and the vivid green
of cocoa-nut palms. The hour was eight o'clock in the morning of a
cloudless March day; the fitful land-breeze had died away, leaving
the whole surface of the sea like billowy glass. Half-a-dozen
cable's-lengths distant on the schooner's starboard quarter, a score
or-more of native _dhonies_ or diving-boats rose and dipped to the
regular motion of the long ground-swell.

It was towards these boats that Don pointed.

That something unusual had occurred was evident enough. Angry shouts
floated across the placid water; and the native boatmen could be seen
hurriedly pulling the boats together into a compact group about one
central spot where the clamour was loudest.

“I say,” cried Jack, after watching the boats for some time in silence,
“they're making for the schooner.”

“I don't half like the look of it,” replied Don uneasily; “they
shouldn't leave the diving grounds, you know, until the signal gun's
fired. I wish the guv was here.”

“Wishing's no good when he's ashore,” said Jack philosophically. “You're
the skipper _pro tem_., and you must make the most of your promotion,
old fellow. We'll have some fun, anyhow. Whew! how those <DW65>s pull,
and what a jolly row they're making!”

By this time the excited cries, which had first attracted the attention
of those upon the schooner's deck, had been exchanged by the boatmen for
a weird chant, to which every oar kept time. Erect in the stern of the
foremost boat an old whiteheaded _tyndal_ or “master” led the song,
while at the end of each measure a hundred voices raised a chorus that
seemed fairly to lift the boats clear of the water.

“What are they singing, anyway?” demanded Jack. “There's something about
a diver and a shark in it, but I can't half make it out, can you?”

“We'll call Puggles--he'll be able to tell us. Pug! Hi, Pug! come here.”

“Coming, sa'b!” answered a voice from the cook's galley; and almost
simultaneously there appeared on deck the plumpest, shiniest, most
good-natured looking black boy that ever displayed two raws of pearly
teeth. Nature had, apparently, pulled him into the world by the nose,
and then, as a sort of finishing touch to the job, had given that organ
a sharp upward tweak and left it so. It was to this feature that Puggles
owed his name.

“Pug,” said his master, “tell us what those boatmen yonder are singing.”

The black boy cocked his ears and listened for a moment with parted
lips. “Boat-wallahs this way telling, sa'b,” said he; and, catching the
strain of the chant, he repeated the words of each line as it fell from
the lips of the old _tyndal_:

               “Salambo selling the diver one charm,

                   Salaam, Alii kum!

               Old shark, he telling, then do no harm,

                   Salaam, Alii kum!

               One spotted shark come out the south,

                   Salaam, Alii kum!

               He taking diver's leg in his mouth,

                   Salaam, Alii kum!

               Me big liking got, he telling, for you,

                   Salaam, Alii kum!

               So he biting diver clean in two,

                   Salaam, Alii kum!

               The lying charmer we take to the ship,

                   Salaam, Alii kum!

               There he feeling bite of the sahib's whip,

                   Salaam, Alii kum!”

“Why, this Salambo must be the chap the guv had whipped off the grounds
last season, eh, Pug?” cried Don excitedly.

“Same black rascal, sa'b. His skin getting well, he coming back. Dey
bring him 'board ship, make his skin sore two times,” explained Puggles,
grinning.

“Ha, ha!” laughed Jack. “We'll oblige 'em! We'll trice the fellow up!
Hullo, here they come!”

The boats having now reached the schooner, the chant ceased abruptly,
the heavy oars were noisily shipped, and, amid a perfect Babel of
voices, the boatmen came swarming up the sides, until the deck was one
mass of wildly gesticulating, dusky humanity. The uproar was terrific.

The old _tyndal_, who towered a full head and shoulders above his
comrades, pushed his way to the front, and commanding silence among his
followers, addressed himself to Don, who was always-recognised as master
in his fathers absence.

“Sab.” said he in pigeon English, “one year back big sa'b ordering
Salambo eat plenty blows for selling charm to diver-man. All same, this
season he done come back and sell plenty charm, telling diver-man he
put charm round neck, shark no eat him up. He telling plenty lie--this
morning one shark done come, eat diver, charm, all!”

“Let him stand forward,” said Don, beginning to enter as much into the
novelty of the thing as Jack himself.

The culprit, a sleek old fellow with shaven head, crafty eyes, and a
rosary of wooden beads about his neck, was shoved to the front.

“Are you the chap who was whipped off the grounds last year for selling
chaims?” demanded Don.

“Your honour speaking true words.” whined the shark-charmer, salaaming
until his shaven head almost touched the deck; “I same rascal.”

“I say, Jack,” whispered Don, “I shan't have him whipped, you know.
We'll, make him walk the plank.”

“Capital! Hell funk, certain, and there'll be no end of fun.”

“Well do it, then,” said Don decidedly. “Go forward and order two of
the lascars to take the boat and lie under the schooner's quarter---this
side, you know--ready to pick him up.”

In high glee Jack departed to execute this commission, while Don again
turned to the shark-doctor.

“Do you happen to have one of those charms about you?” he asked.

“One here got, sa'b,” said the fellow, producing from the folds of his
waist-cloth an _ola_ or fragment of palm-leaf, covered with cabalistic
characters. “Sa'b no look at him?”

“Keep it yourself,” said Don; “you'll soon need it. Hi, lascar!” to one
of the schooner's crew who stood near. “Fetch a plank here and run it
out over the side.”

By the time the plank was brought and run out until one-half its
length projected over the water, Jack came up chuckling, and by a sign
intimated that the boat was in readiness. The crowd of natives, guessing
that something unusual was afoot, craned their necks eagerly,
while Puggles executed a comic _pas seul_ in his delight. But the
shark-charmer, as Jack had predicted, “funked” miserably.

Knowing that with the boat in waiting there was absolutely no danger to
the shark-charmer's life, Don turned a deaf ear to his pleadings, and
made a signal to the lascars to proceed.

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Willing hands seized the quaking wretch and dragged him to the
schooner's side, where he was placed upon, the plank, Puggles standing
on the deck-end to keep it down.

“Steady, Puggles!” cried Don. “One, two, three--let him slide!”

Puggles jumped aside, the deck-end of the plank rose high in air, then
descended with a crash; and with a scream of terror the shark-charmer
disappeared over the side.

A tremendous shout rose from the natives on deck, and with a common
impulse they one and all rushed to the schooner's side, which they
reached just as the shark-charmer's head reappeared above the surface.
Another moment, and he was dragged into the boat, where, catching sight
of the laughing faces ranged along the rail above, he shook his fist in
mute menace, and so was rowed to shore.

“Teach the beggar a lesson he won't forget in a hurry,” said Don, as he
watched the boat recede. “Good-bye, old boy; we're not likely to meet
again.”

But in this sanguine forecast of the future he was mistaken, as events
speedily proved.




CHAPTER II. A STROKE OF LUCK AND AN AFTER-STROKE.


 It was the afternoon of the day on which the shark-charmer so
unwillingly walked the plank. The breeze was so light and fitful that it
barely ruffled the surface of the sea about the schooner. Weary of the
narrow limits of the deck, Don and his chum dropped into the boat and
rowed ashore--Puggles, as a matter of course, bearing them company.

“These beastly sands are like an oven!” growled Don, lifting his helmet
to cool his dripping forehead. “Where shall we go, Jack?”

“Bazaar,” replied Jack laconically; “always some fun to be had there.
Pug, point for the bazaar.”

“Me pointing, sar,” puffed the black boy, setting his dumpy legs in
motion.

Puggles was never so much in his element as when thus strutting
pompously in advance, warning common <DW65> humanity of the white
sahibs' approach. At such times the disdainful tilt of his nose, the
supreme self-complaisance of his expansive grin, were as good as a show.

A gay and animated scene did the bazaar present. Back and forth through
the temporary street surged an endless throng of natives of every
shade of complexion and variety of costume--buying, selling, shouting,
jabbering, drinking with friends or fighting with enemies.

“Much cry and little wool,” laughed Jack. “There's a big black fellow
yonder auctioning off some pearl oysters; let's have a go at the next
lot.”

“All right,” assented Don; “perhaps we'll have a stroke of luck. The guv
knew a poor half-caste once who bid in just such a chance lot as this,
and in one of them he found sixty-eight thumping big pearls. Cleared
thousands of pounds by that one bid, the guv says. Pug! here, Pug!”

“Coming, sa'b,” gasped a faint voice, and Puggles wriggled his way from
amongst the bystanders, shining with abundant perspiration and squeezed
well-nigh flat by the pressure of the crowd.

“Pug,” said his master, “up on this creel with you, and when that big
black fellow yonder puts up his next lot, bid 'em in.”

Up went Puggles, nothing loth to escape further squeezing, and up went
the auctioneer's next lot. In five minutes' time the few dozens of
oysters composing the lot were knocked down to the black boy at an
absurdly low figure.

“Here you are,” said Don, handing him the coin. “Pass that over, and
fetch the things away till we see what's inside them.”

Making a dive for the oysters, Puggles scrambled them into his cloth,
and followed the sahibs to the outskirts of the crowd, blowing like
a porpoise. Finding a convenient patch of shade beneath a banyan tree
within a few yards of the lazy surf, they proceeded to ascertain,
without further delay, whether the shells contained anything of value.

“Him plenty smell got, anyhow,” commented Puggles, as he arranged
the oysters, which had been several days out of the water, in a small
pyramid.

Jack threw himself on the sand, and surveyed the rough, discoloured heap
with unqualified disgust. “They don't look very promising, I must say,”
 he cried. “Try that big one on top, Don.”

Inserting the blade of his pocket-knife between the shells of the
bivalve, Don prized it open and carefully examined its contents. It
contained nothing of any value.

Jack looked listlessly on, while his companion opened shell after
shell with no other result than the finding of two or three miserable
specimens of pearls, so small that, as Jack laughingly said, “one might
stick them in ones eye and forget the moment after where one had put
them.”

Only three or four shells now remained unopened, and Don was on the
point of abandoning the search in disgust, when Jack, who had edged
himself on his elbow as close to the heap as the villainous odour of the
decomposed oysters would allow, snatched up a shell of large size, and
said:

“Let me have the knife a moment, will you? This looks promising--it's
the biggest of the whole lot, anyhow.”

“There you are, then; I've had enough of them myself,” said Don, tossing
him the knife and walking off.

He had not proceeded half-a-dozen yards, however, when a loud shout
brought him back at a run. Jack and Puggles were eagerly bending over
the opened oyster.

“What is it?” he asked breathlessly, going down on his knees beside
them.

Jack thrust the half-shell towards him. It was literally filled with
magnificent pearls. *

     * In 1828 no less than sixty-seven pearls were taken from a
     single oyster on these grounds.--J. K. H.

Not a word was spoken as the glistening, priceless globules were
carefully abstracted from their unsightly case and laid upon Pug's
coffee- palm. Twenty-five pearls of matchless size and
brilliancy did Jack count out ere the store was exhausted. So taken up
were they with their good fortune that not one of the three observed a
native creep stealthily towards them under cover of the tree.

“There's been nothing like it known on the grounds for years!” cried Don
excitedly. “Any more, Jack?”

“No more,” said Jack, and was about to throw the shell away, when
Puggles caught his arm.

“Stop, sar, stop! Me see something yellow in shell. Stick knife in the
meat, sar, that side.”

With the point of the blade Jack prodded the substance of the oyster
at the point indicated, and presently laid bare the queen of the royal
family of pearls on which they had stumbled. Larger by far than any of
the twenty-five already taken from the shell, this latest addition to
the number was in shape like a pear, in lustre of the purest pale
yellow.

“Him gold pearl, sa'b!” cried Puggles gleefully, grinning from ear to
ear. “Other only silver. Gold pearl plenty price fetching.”

“Jack, old fellow,” cried Don, thumping his companion on the back,
“Puggles is right; we're in luck. I've heard the guv say that a golden
pearl isn't found once in twenty years. The priests are ready to give
simply any sum you like for a really fine specimen.”

The native who had concealed himself behind the trunk of the banyan
tree, leaned eagerly forward. So close was he to the absorbed group
that he could distinctly hear every word of their conversation. As he
listened, an avaricious glitter shone in his crafty eyes, and he rubbed
his hands unctuously together, as though he were rubbing pearls between
them.

“How much do you suppose the lot is worth; Don?” Jack inquired.

“Some thousands of pounds, I should say. But the guv will be able to
tell us. Say, I'd better put them in this.”

Taking out his watch, he drew off the soft chamois leather case, and
carefully transferred the output of the mammoth oyster from Pugs palm to
this temporary receptacle.

“Now,” cried Jack, leaping to his feet, “let's make for the schooner.
The sun's set, and besides, I shan't feel easy until the golden 'un is
in a safer place than a waistcoat pocket.”

“That's so,” assented Don. “Point, Pug!”

When they had disappeared in the crowded bazaar, the shark-charmer
emerged from behind the tree, and took the road to that part of the
beach where the boats lay.

