But they should be taught not to take white men's heads," Sheldon
argued.

She nodded approval, and said, "If we find one head we'll burn the
village. Hey, you, Charley! What fella place head he stop?"

"S'pose he stop along devil-devil house," was the answer. "That big
fella house, he devil-devil."

It was the largest house in the village, ambitiously ornamented with
fancy-plaited mats and king-posts carved into obscene and monstrous forms
half-human and half-animal. Into it they went, in the obscure light
stumbling across the sleeping-logs of the village bachelors and knocking
their heads against strings of weird votive-offerings, dried and
shrivelled, that hung from the roof-beams. On either side were rude
gods, some grotesquely carved, others no more than shapeless logs swathed
in rotten and indescribably filthy matting. The air was mouldy and heavy
with decay, while strings of fish-tails and of half-cleaned dog and
crocodile skulls did not add to the wholesomeness of the place.

In the centre, crouched before a slow-smoking fire, in the littered ashes
of a thousand fires, was an old man who blinked apathetically at the
invaders. He was extremely old--so old that his withered skin hung about
him in loose folds and did not look like skin. His hands were bony
claws, his emaciated face a sheer death's-head. His task, it seemed, was
to tend the fire, and while he blinked at them he added to it a handful
of dead and mouldy wood. And hung in the smoke they found the object of
their search. Joan turned and stumbled out hastily, deathly sick,
reeling into the sunshine and clutching at the air for support.

"See if all are there," she called back faintly, and tottered aimlessly
on for a few steps, breathing the air in great draughts and trying to
forget the sight she had seen.

Upon Sheldon fell the unpleasant task of tallying the heads. They were
all there, nine of them, white men's heads, the faces of which he had
been familiar with when their owners had camped in Berande compound and
set up the poling-boats. Binu Charley, hugely interested, lent a hand,
turning the heads around for identification, noting the hatchet-strokes,
and remarking the distorted expressions. The Poonga-Poonga men gloated
as usual, and as usual the Tahitians were shocked and angry, several of
them cursing and muttering in undertones. So angry was Matapuu, that he
strode suddenly over to the fire-tender and kicked him in the ribs,