leaning over the rail she called out to
Hekemanu: _Ta mai te taga tupe_ ("give me the bag of money").

The man for'ard hauled on the line to bring the boat alongside the
schooner, and Hekemanu stood up with the heavy bag in his hand.

"Hold on there, you fool! If you drop that bag I'll knock your head
off," said the skipper. "Here, Mr. Bates, just you jump down and take
that money from that native, or he'll drop it, sure."

Before Hekemanu had time to let it fall over the side the mate had
jumped into the boat and taken it.

Lannigan, putting his head up out of the little cabin, groaned inwardly
as he saw the mate step over the rail with the fateful bag and hand it
to the supercargo.

"Be the powers, ye're in a mighty hurry for the money," said Lannigan,
roughly, taking it from him, "ye might ax me if I had a mouth on me
first."

The supercargo laughed and put a bottle of gin on the table, and
Lannigan's fertile brain commenced to work. If he could only get the
supercargo out of the cabin for a minute he meant to pick up the bag,
and declaring he was insulted get it back into his boat and tell him
to come and count it ashore. Then he could get capsized on the reef and
lose it. They were always having "barneys," and it would only be looked
upon as one of his usual freaks.

*****

"What the deuce is that?" he said, pointing to a hideous,
highly-coloured paper mask that hung up in the cabin.

The supercargo handed it to him. "It's for a man in Samoa--a silly,
joking body, always playing pranks wi' the natives, and I thoct he would
like the thing."

"Bedad, 'tis enough to scare the sowl out av the divil," said Lannigan.

Just then a mob of natives came aft, and the two men in the cabin heard
the captain tell them to clear out again. They were saucy and wouldn't
go. Hekemanu had told them of the failure of Lannigan's dodge, and they
had an idea that the ship would take him away, and stood by to rescue
him at the word of command.

"I'll verra soon hunt them," said the supercargo, with a proud smile,
and he put the mask on his face. Tariro made a bolt on deck and called
out to the natives that the supercargo was going to frighten them with a
mask.

*****

Instead of wild yells of fear and jumping overboard, as he imagined
would happen, the natives merely laughed, but edged away for'ard.

The schooner was in quite close to the reef; the water was very deep,
and there was no danger of striking. She was under