The Ocean Wireless Boys on the Pacific

“Let’s hope all that he has been through has taught him a good lesson,” said Jack.

“It surely ought to have,” said Billy, and then the subject was dismissed by a tall, half-clothed native striding into the lobby and beating stridently on a huge brass gong inscribed with queer characters.

“What’s that for?” asked Jack of the clerk behind the desk who looked like a German.

“Dot iss for Riz Tavel,” replied the clerk.

“For Riz who?” asked Billy.

“For Riz Tavel,” rejoined the man impatiently, as if surprised at their ignorance. “Riz Tavel, dot means lunch.”

“Oh, I see,” replied Jack. “Well, I’m ready for it whatever they call it.”

At the summons of the gong several guests of the hotel came into the lobby, appearing as if they had just got out of bed. The boys were amazed to see that many of the male guests wore pyjamas, while the women were in negligee. This, however, applied only to the half castes and Dutch residents. The Germans and English, who did most of the trading at Bomobori, wore tropical suits of conventional make.

They were waited on by barefooted Malays who set before each of the boys and their shipmates, when these latter appeared, big soup plates full of rice.

“They call this the 'riz-tavel,’ that means the rice table,” explained Captain Sparhawk, thus clearing away the secret of the mysterious words. “Rice is a staple all through the East, just like bread is at home.”

Having filled their plates with rice, as they saw everybody else do, the Americans waited for the next move. The waiters had all vanished after depositing the rice, and Jack was moved to remark whether that was all they were going to get.

His question was answered by the re-appearance of the barefooted servitors. They bore numerous dishes piled with fish, duck, chicken, pork, omelette, onions and peppers. The guests all piled portions of every one of these dishes on the top of the rice, and the visitors seeing that they were not expected to ask for more plates were fain to do the same. The boys, however, balked at a thin curried sauce which was supposed to be poured over this hodge-podge of edibles.

Having disposed of what in itself was a mighty meal they then found that they were expected to despatch beefsteaks, salad and fruit.

“Well, they don’t starve you here, that’s one thing sure,” said Jack.

“You must remember that their 'breakfast,’ as they call it, is eaten in the cool of the morning and usually only consists of coffee and fruit,” said Captain Sparhawk.

A groan from the dyspeptic Mr. Jukes, who had eaten a hearty meal, was followed soon after by the breaking up of the party. There was much to be attended to, but Captain Sparhawk said it would be useless to try to transact business till the late afternoon when the sea breeze sprung up. The interval between riz-tavel and that hour he said was set aside for sleeping, and nobody ever dreamed of interfering with the custom. In fact, he would have found nobody to transact business with.

He warned the boys against walking about in the scorchingly hot afternoon sun also, as it was said to induce fevers. There was nothing left for them to do, therefore, but to pass the afternoon in their rooms, although they would have preferred exploring the town.

When they came down again they found Donald Judson in the lobby. He appeared very disconsolate. He said that no ships for American ports would call at the port for a long time.

“I guess I’m stuck here for the rest of my life,” he complained, and then made a sudden suggestion.

“Say, why can’t you take me with you on that expedition?” he asked, for the boys had told him something about the object of their presence in New Guinea.

“Um – er – I don’t know that Mr. Jukes wants anybody else along,” hesitated Jack.

“I’d work hard and do anything I was told to,” said Donald pleadingly. “Won’t you ask him about it? It’s awful to be stuck here like a bump on a log.”

“Well, perhaps we might see about it,” relented Jack, really feeling sorry for the unhappy plight of their former enemy, mean and despicable as he had proved himself to have been in the past.

“Thanks, awfully,” exclaimed Donald, gratefully, and he went off through the gardens, saying that he was going to get himself a pair of new shoes. Soon after Mr. Jukes, having got over his attack of dyspepsia, appeared, the boys laid Donald’s request before him.

“I really don’t know,” he hesitated. “Of course, the lad is in hard luck, but somehow I don’t exactly like his looks and I don’t see what use he could be to us. I’d rather leave money here to pay for his living till some ship arrives he could get a berth on.”

“If you left him money in a place like this he might fall back into his old bad ways,” suggested Jack.

“That is true. I wouldn’t wish to push any one down the hill when there was a chance of helping them up,” said the millionaire, musingly. “Well, I’ll see about it,” he added after an interval of thought. Just then, as Captain Sparhawk came up, the incident was ended and the two elders set out for a trading store to arrange for supplies and other necessaries for their dash into the interior, for Mr. Jukes had resolved to act on Donald Judson’s unexpected clue and make his way up the river.

“I’ve got a notion that if we did take that fellow Donald along that he would make trouble for us,” said Raynor as soon as they were out of ear-shot.

“I don’t see how he could, or what object he would have,” doubted Jack. “Still, I myself wouldn’t trust him very far, in spite of his declarations of reform.”

But as it so happened neither of the boys need have troubled themselves over the matter, for that evening, when Mr. Jukes sent for Donald to have a talk with him, the boy’s manner had changed entirely. He was no longer servile and cringing as he had been earlier. In fact, he intimated very plainly that he wanted nothing more to do with the Jukes party.

There was a reason for this, a reason that none of the party naturally was able at the time to guess. Donald’s change of front was not due to any mere caprice. A deep-seated reason lay behind it, and that reason was rooted in an encounter he had had just after he left the boys in the hotel garden.

CHAPTER XX. – A TRAITOR IN CAMP

Donald’s encounter had been with no less a personage than ‘Bully’ Broom himself, whose spies in the town had informed him that a party of Americans had arrived on a yacht and had been making inquiries about a missing man named Jukes. Broom at once knew that the half-suspected had happened, and that a strong party in search of the missing man had, by some inexplicable (to him) chance, arrived in Bomobori.

He perceived at once that Donald’s presence at the hotel, where he had abandoned him to his fate, might result disastrously for him and he congratulated himself that the boy did not know more of the fate of Jerushah Jukes than he had already told our friends. But even that meager information, Broom foresaw, might be used to great advantage, so he posted himself in a resort frequented by men of his type of whom there are many in the South Seas, and despatched some of his crew to look for the boy he had cast off.

It was not long before Donald who, to do him justice, came unwillingly at first, was presented to Broom by two villainous-looking half-caste Malay sailors, for Broom had few white men in his crew.

“They talk too much,” he was wont to say.

As soon as Donald appeared, the ‘Bully’ reversed his usual tactics and tried to make himself as pleasant as possible. He was a huge-framed ruffian with a tangled black beard, and burned brown enough by sun and wind to be taken for a negro. Donald soon saw that he had nothing to fear from Broom now, and being a sharp boy he proceeded to take the initiative after some verbal sparring.

“You’ve got an awful nerve sending for me after the treatment you gave me,” he observed. “What do you want, anyhow?”

“Now see here, boy,” bellowed Broom, in his gruff voice which he tried to render amiable without much success, so used was he to ruling his band with an iron hand, “I’ll admit that I may have used you a bit roughly, but that was the way of the sea. A fine young fellow like you, though, oughtn’t to mind that. A little knocking about is good for you.”

“Yes, and it was good for me to be left stranded in this hole, too, I suppose,” said Donald.

“I didn’t leave you stranded. I was merely out of funds and was coming back to pay you up and get you out of trouble,” protested Broom, with an earnestness that appeared genuine. “See here.”

He plunged his hand into his pocket and drew out a handful of gold and then let it fall trickling on the table.

“That doesn’t look as if I wasn’t able to do it, either, does it?” he demanded. “Now, see here,” he went on, “I’ve got a proposition to make to you. You’re a smart lad, a clever lad, and one that’s bound to get on the world. I’m going to help you, too.”

“Well, what do you want?” demanded Donald, who was very susceptible to flattery, and who had a weak nature, easily played upon by any one skillful enough to touch the right chord.

“That gang that arrived on the yacht? What about them?” came from Broom.

“They are going to cook your hash if you don’t look out,” said Donald. “That’s Jukes’ brother, and they’re going to find him wherever you’ve put him and then nab you.”

“So that’s the program, eh?” muttered the ‘Bully.’ “Now see here, Donald, I want you on my side and I’m not afraid to pay for it. A smart and clever boy like you could do me a deal of harm if you were sided with the enemy. You’ll be no loser by it. You haven’t told them anything about our little deal with the Centurion yet, have you?”

Donald did some quick thinking. He was sharp enough to see that Broom was afraid of what he might have said, for even in Bomobori there was law and if it were known to Mr. Jukes that Broom was in the vicinity it would be immediately invoked. He balanced his two opportunities against each other. Cupidity, greed for money, had always been his main fault, and now he thought he saw a way to make more out of Broom than he could out of Mr. Jukes. Besides, although he had appeared so humbled before the boys, and ashamed of his past conduct, his hatred still rankled, for the reason that he blamed all his troubles on them and had often brooded over plans of revenge.

“No, I haven’t told them anything about the Centurion,” he said at length, fearing that if he told Broom how much the Jukes party knew the freebooter might withdraw from any deal he was about to make. “I simply gave them a cock-and-bull story about myself when they were astonished to find me here.”

“Ah! So you know them, then? They are friends of yours?” exclaimed Broom.