166 MYSTIC ISLES 



"I 'm captain N. P. Benson of the schooner El Dor- 

 ado/' vouchsafed the third. "Where's the American 

 Connsul?" 



I led them n few hundred feet to the office of Dentist 

 Williams, who was acting as consul for the United 

 States. He had a keen love of adventure, and twenty 

 years in the tropics had not dimmed his interest in the 

 marvelous sea. He left his patient and closeted him- 

 self with the trio, while I returned to their boat to in- 

 spect it more closely. 



All the workers and loafers of the waterfront were 

 about it, but Goeltz would let none enter it, he believing 

 it might be needed untouched as evidence of some sort. 

 There are no wharf thieves and no fences in Tahiti, so 

 there was no danger of loss, and, really, there was noth- 

 ing worth stealing but the boat itself. 



Captain Benson and his companions hastened from 

 the dentist's to Lovaina's, where they were given a table 

 on the verand^a alone. They remained an hour secluded 

 after Iromea and Atupu had piled their table with 

 dishes. They drank quarts of coffee, and ate a beef- 

 steak each, dozens of eggs, and m-any slices of fried ham, 

 with scores of hot biscuits. They never spoke during 

 the meal. A customs-officer had accompanied them to 

 the Tiare Hotel, for the French Government wisely 

 made itself certain that they might not be an unknown 

 kind of smugglers, pirates, or runaways. Their boat 

 had been taken in charge by the customs bureau, and 

 the men were free to do what they would. 



When they came from their gorging to the garden, 

 they picked flowers, smelled the many kinds of blossoms, 

 and then the sailors lighted their cigars. This pair were 



