The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1907-06-09
The Submerged White
BY Bunker Kluegel in the Cosmopolitan.

I iously at the boat and then at their
feet. The purser gave them a shove
and down they went. A fat Portuguese
woman with rolling eyes calculated,
TIN SO scare!' and the young fellows
who had staged it from one of the
plantations got in without fuss.
Anderson will be here for load OF
cattle next week." called Buckley, as
the boat pulled out. The watchers on
shore waitel till it passed through the
channel in the coral reef to deep water
and was finally hoisted to the davits.
A couple of hours later, when the XII
nau was far on her way down the
coast Charley Curtis stood in his door
looking hard at a small envelope. His
face was not pleasant to see Around
the edge of the shaven hair the skin
was white, but it darkened quickly on
the forehead and roughened into deep
wrinkles. Blush eyes We're set in yell
low, bloodshot eyeballs. A brown-gray
mustache and imperial spread over
cheek and skin into six days stub
BILE, and the lines about the mouth
showed hard as he shifted his cigarette.
The ea-breeze of the late afternoon
was dropping the yellow pods of the
algaroba, and Curtis shifted them
back and forth with his bare knotted
toes as he stood looking down at the
little envelope.
1t contained a note written in fine.
oldfashioned hand The writer was
sure the letter would reach dear
Charley for he must be living in sthe
same place as when that last letter
came five years ago. And if he was
not, no great matter, for she and
father We're coming out to find him.
Things had gone well on the farm. The
crops of five years had added to their
savings, SO now they could be there to
spend Thanksgiving with him. She
was proud of her boy who was post
master of his town, but she knew he
would be lonely in his snug little cot
tage. He had written last time that he
had never married, so the mother was
coming to keep house for him.
Curtis folded the letter and looked
around the room. Officially, it was the
United States Post Office of Kawaihae. |
row of pigeonholes above a table,
small safe, two il-pouches-these
We're the department. By his chair was
a pair of shoes to be put on over SOCK |
ess feet when the whistle sounded, !
slipped off as he returned to the ROOM /
and dumped beside the mailhags. I
on nail by the telephone |
was a coat He had used it a good |
deal lately-the cough had made the I
warm rains seem chill.
From the room he looked out the /
must be lonely" The path went wind
ng about stones and dried mud-holes
to the shack that stood high off the
ground. Chickens settled down com-
,ortably under it, away from the heat,
md pecked at the chips of whitewash
There were dingy curtains at the win-
lows, and a door between was painted
blue. On the steps at Kawiki, her
black hair falling over red holoku,
Ter brown feet showing beneath the
1em, and the smell of her pipe strong
N the air. !,
He smoked through two cigarettes,
Ind the look on his face was not good.
Then he turned and came into the Of
Ice. From the shelf he took down
bottle and half filled a tin cup, slowly, ;
calculating as he poured out the mud
iy, strong-smelling stuff. It would
axe him an hour to finish the mail
nd write the letter By drinking at
requent intervals and with the start
le already had, he would be ready in
ust about that time to stretch out on
he floor. The ava root the woman
made was a good thing. At first taste
had seemed sickening stuff, over
covering in its strength and disgusting
ecause of the filthy way it was made.
sut that was years ago when he was
Il white. Now he was grateful for its
trength Whiskey could have small
lace in the living of twenty dollars a
1onth for himself, the woman, and
er child. Anyway the ava root was
etter. 1t was fearfully raw and dirty,
ut it did the busineSs-gOt him there
uicker and made him stay longer.
He went over to the safe and from
ulled a plain envelope. In it were two
and he laid them side by
de and looked at them for long
me- :
The cards were widowed but the {
ices were still clear--one young and
milling with steady, dark eyes, the
Their womanly, tender with lines of
we and care. On one was traced with
lded ink the word Mother" But {
ven as he started to read the lines
n the other, he turned them both
ack Still looking at the faces, he
,ached for a candle, lighted it. and