The Ocean Wireless Boys on the Pacific

This exactly suited the boys, and their delight, when Mr. Jukes decided to stay at the island for some days, was unbounded. The reason for the decision to remain there was arrived at after the millionaire had held a consultation with Captain Sparhawk. Tahiti was not far off, and that night Jack was ordered to raise the wireless station on the French island and find out if a small vessel could not be despatched at once with coal to replenish the Sea Gypsy’s exhausted bunkers.

The next morning Jack had the satisfaction of informing Mr. Jukes that the details had been arranged and that a small tramp steamer might be expected to come to their relief in a few days. The expense was considerable, but this did not appear to bother Mr. Jukes, who chafed at the delay in his search for the survivors, if any there were, of the Centurion.

CHAPTER XI. – THE CAVE OF THE PEARLS

Two days later, following the arrival at the island of the coal ship – a small, rusty tramp steamer – the boys set out for the village to meet their friends, who had swum out to the ship almost daily, despite the sharks, to see the white youths. As they left the yacht they saw Thurman, who had been put to work in the crew, laboring with the other blackened “hands” at getting the fuel on board.

“He doesn’t look as if he liked his job much,” said Jack.

“He ought to be glad he’s alive,” supplemented Billy Raynor. “I wonder if he has really mended his ways or if it was just the effect of his scare that made him promise to reform.”

“Impossible to say,” replied Jack, “but time will show, I guess.”

The boys found their friends on the beach with a long, cranky-looking canoe, paddled with wonderfully carved paddles. In the canoe were bananas, roast pork and other delicacies; also several empty cocoanut shells.

“What are those for?” asked Jack, looking at the latter.

“We put um pearl in them if so be we get any,” grinned Anai.

“Do you really think we’ll get any?” asked Billy.

“No can say. Think cave good place. You ready?”

“Whenever you are,” said Jack, taking his place in the canoe, while Billy followed his example. The two native lads shoved off and sprang on board with wonderful agility, driving the canoe through the surf and up onto the summit of a huge wave, where it hung poised for an instant like a bird. The next moment they had shot with powerful strokes through the rollers and were out beyond the danger line of the surf.

They passed through a noisy fleet of fishers, all of whom greeted them, and then the canoe was headed for a green headland some distance down the coast. The sun glowed fiercely overhead, the surf boomed unceasingly on the beach and the reef beyond, the water hissed along the sides of the canoe as the two athletic young natives urged forward amid shouts.

Looking over the side, Jack could see the coral bottom as clearly as if an inch instead of many feet of water separated it from the frail canoe. It was almost as if they were floating in the air. Fish of brilliant colors darted about and once a dark, sinister shade appeared beneath the canoe. The Kanaka boys shouted and beat the water with their paddles. The dark shadow melted away.

“Him very bad shark,” said Anai. “White men call him tiger shark. Worst kind of all shark.”

“I’d hate to bathe around here,” observed Jack.

“Oh, him all right, most generally scare him away, kick, splash, makee big noise, he go 'way.”

“Yes, but suppose he refused to be scared,” objected Billy.

“Then maybe he takee off leg, arm, maybe swallow you all up.”

The long, curved point soon hid the fishers in front of the village from view. Rounding it, they found themselves skimming along a coast of surpassing beauty. Steep, majestic cliffs arose from the clear water and long green creepers from the forest above trailed over them.

At last the prow of the canoe was turned and the boys saw that the furious paddlers were heading at top speed for the cliffs.

“Hey, stop that, you’ll smash the canoe!” cried Jack, as, without any diminution of speed, the canoe was urged with wild shouts from the paddlers right at the rocky escarpment.

“They’ve gone crazy,” exclaimed Billy, “they – ”

He did not conclude what he was going to say. Instead, he set up a cry of alarm as the prow of the canoe was hurled at the cliff at a spot where a regular curtain of lianas and other forest trailers depended from above.

Swish, whoosh, went the canoe, as it shot through the parasites and creepers. The boys instinctively ducked their heads. Instead of being dashed to destruction against the cliff, the frail craft had been guided into this singular cave, one of many along the coast, through the greenery portal. Both the Kanaka boys set up a shout of laughter at the expense of Jack and Billy, who looked rather sheepish at their late alarm.

They were in a dark passage that led into an inner water cave filled with an eternal sunless twilight that was very refreshing to them after the heat and glare outside. The canoe shot through the passage and into the cave itself, the boys uttering a shout of admiration the while.

“Look,” said Anai, pointing upward.

Overhead was a marvelously perfect, natural dome, with a large hole in the centre through which shafts of sunlight fell into the cave and were reflected from the water with a greenish light.

“Look,” ordered the Kanaka boy again.

The boys obeyed and gazed over the side of the canoe. Below them, through several feet of crystal-clear water, they could see bowers of coral, white and pink, with fish darting in and out of the chinks and crossing prismatically, while others hung motionless as if suspended, fanning the water incessantly with their gauzy fins. It was the most wonderful water picture the boys had ever seen.

CHAPTER XII. – A TRAP!

“We eat. Then we go get pearls,” decided Anai.

The boys, whose appetites had been sharpened by the trip, were not averse to this, and they made a hearty meal. After it the two native boys produced leaves in which betel nuts had been carefully wrapped up and offered them to Jack and Billy, both of whom declined them. But Anai and his friend began chewing the spicy nuts with great zest.

A canoe-length from where they floated a clear rill of water stole noiselessly down from above, mingling its sweet waters with the sea. After demolishing their betel nuts, the chewing of which is a well-nigh universal custom in the South Seas, the two native boys stood erect and then bound their long black hair in knots on the top of their heads.

Then, with a shout, they balanced gracefully for a second on the edge of the canoe and plunged over. They floated for a minute or two and then dived, after inhaling immense breaths. To the boys, watching the divers through the clear water, it looked as if they were literally climbing down, head first, through the pellucid depths.

Then they saw both the Kanaka lads wrenching oyster shells from their hold on the coral with furious energy. It seemed impossible that they could stay under water as long as they did, but at length, even their wonderful endurance gave out and, laden with shells, they shot back to the surface.

Reaching the canoe, the two divers hung almost exhausted on the outrigger, regaining their breath after they had thrown several oysters into the canoe, which the boys opened eagerly, but only two small pearls rewarded them. The two Kanaka boys showed plainly the stress of the long time they had stayed down. Their eyes were bloodshot and their faces suffused. Their veins stood out on their bodies like cords.

The boys begged them not to go down again, but they insisted.

“How often do you mean to dive?” asked Billy.

“One, maybe two, three time,” said Anai.

“Nobody can dive more than three time,” declared the other. “Him bad if dive too many time. Makee much sick.”

“I should think so,” said Jack. “I wouldn’t have thought it possible for any one to stay down so long. It’s wonderful.”

The next two dives yielded three more pearls from a dozen or more oysters. None of them were of any great value but the two divers insisted on presenting them to the boys.

“Me try get you very good pearl some udder day,” promised Anai, and his companion nodded to show that he meant to help in the enterprise.

“Hullo, what’s that?” asked Jack suddenly, after they had chatted and rested for some time and began to think about returning. There was a booming sound in the air and the waters of the cave began to become agitated, rocking the canoe dangerously.

Overhead, through the dome, they could see that the sky had darkened.

“Me think storm come. Better get out of here,” said Anai, looking troubled. “Him bad time of year for storms.”

“Goodness, I should say so,” declared Jack. “We’ve been in two bad ones already.”

“That’s how we got blown here,” added Billy.