286 MYSTIC ISLES 



The Dummy uttered a demoniacal grunt, and shook 

 his head and hands before Lovaina in accusation. She 

 answered him with a movement of her head up and 

 down, which signified acquiescence. 



"Dummy know," she said mysteriously. "That Vava 

 he find everything. He like old-time tahutahu, sor- 

 cerer. He tell me Annexe no fish. He say now no 

 fish till finish those masheen." 



She laughed and rubbed my shoulders. 



"The fish slip away," she said, "and leave only their 

 scales! AueT 



M. Lontane, the second in command of the gendarmes, 

 was sent scouting, and reported to the governor — not 

 the one who originated the manifesto — ^that the famine 

 was the result of an organized revolt against the law 

 and order of the land. Fishermen he had questioned, 

 replied simply, ''Ait a faito, paru! Ait a hoo, paru!'^ 

 Which, holy blue! meant, "No scales, fish! No price, 

 fish!" 



What to do? One cannot make a horse drink unless 

 one gives him red peppers to eat. Even the Govern- 

 ment could not make a fisherman fish for market, as 

 there was a law against enforced labor except as pun- 

 ishment for crime or in emergencies, such as during the 

 existence of martial law, the guarding against a con- 

 flagration, or a tidal wave or cyclone. At the Cercle 

 Militaire many of the bureaucrats, and especially the 

 doctor who had treated the cow-bov, were for martial 

 law, anj^way. Napoleon knew, said the fierce medecin. 

 "A whiff of grapeshot, and the reef would be again 

 gleaming with lights, and the diligences would pour in 

 with loads of fish." 



