The Press., 1915-06-09
Pearl of the
 Crossroads How She Met Her Fate.
By FREDERICK BRIGGS
Copyright by Frank A. Munsey c

good for nothing but to chase about the world and send people presents. Pearl
 Smith had known this all her life, though perhaps she had never resolved it into just that expression.
 She drew the line at having more than one man on the same ship. Still, this was not at all inconvenient, for there were sometimes no less than four teen men-of-war, besides a score of merchant ships, in the crossroads of the Pacific at one time.
 The girl came by the prosaic name of Smith because her fathers name had
 been something else in some other | country. He came to Honolulu before the cable was in good working order and remained. Marrying half caste Kanaka girl, he had kept a sailors boarding house on Kings road since Pearl was a baby. The presents had been coming in since the little g@l was | big enough to climb on a sailorman's s knee, and their volume increased with her size. She was grown up at four | teen. To see her then was like being walk | ened from a sweet sleep on a balmy | afternoon by having great clusters of | red, red roses pressed to ones cheeks. Young men dropping in at the Cross roads swore that they would never go to sea again. only to ship with the next | tide for the lnlian ocean in search of a pearl to match her skin.
 She was like Honolulu days The shimmering softness of her skin match ed the warm afternoon skies. Rich reds of the island sunsets burned in her full, dimpled mouth. Tropic twi- lights lay behind her inky eyelashes, deepening to midnight in her long hair. Men-Of-war's men and merchant sail ors sent different presents. The navy men leaned toward fancy jewelry and manicure sets, while the traders stuck to silk, uncut rubies, loose pearls, ivory fans and ostrich plumes.
 This from the young men. To emu merate the junk that was dumped at the feet of this island goddess by silly old sea captains and others would be to copy the cargo bills of an East a.ld West India tradesman. There would also be list of small animals and birds, with a number of arctic treas- ures appended. Pearl kept what she fancied, and her father sold the rest.
 As for a girl accepting presents from a dozen men at the same time, it must be remembered that Pearl lived neither east of Frisco nor west of SueZ, which is only another way of saying that the girl was bred in a mans country, where anything a woman gets is so much for her gain and no less for her honor.
 New admirers invariably meant more presents. But when a Sailorman can jolly his superior officer and get any thing he wants just for the asking wo- men had better beware of him. When he stands six feet ill his socks, laughs out of big blue eyes and cOnceals a cello note in a draWling voice so much the worse for the women. Heine-that was as far as they got with hts name aboard ship, and it will suffice here Heine was all of this and more. He was an American bluejacket, boat swain's mate of the destroyer Shark.
 There is one amusement the Ha- waiians have which Americans do not
  CTS and are good swimmers, but sight that is seen in Hawaiian waters is never seen on an American coast. A Hawaiian takes with him to the beach a board, usually about twice his length. This board he carries out as far as he can; then, placing himself on it, it bears him, forced by the waves, back again to the beach. Those who are not expert at this exercise may lie flat on the board, but those who are trained to it stand erect, balancing their bodies as they roll toward the shore.
 He met Pearl at Waikiki beach. She was shooting the surf when Heine saw her first. Standing upright with out flung arms, she balanced on her polish ed board of kamani wood as it raced ahead of giant breaker. Swift as the wave she flashed past the swimming sailor, but as the waters broke over his head he remembered every line of her beautiful body. The grace of her atti- tude struck him harder than the wave. Turning, he swan strongly toward the beach, where the spent roller had land ed the fairy surf rider.
 Half a dozen men were begging Pearl to be allowed to take her board out to the reef again, but she laughed them away with a flash of milk white teeth and struggled out alone. Heine met her q hundred fathoms from the beach, where the water came almost to his shoulders as he stood on the sand.
 "I'll carry your board for you!' he cried as the girl broke through wave almost upon him.
 Startled, she turned her head, and the board slipped, striking on her flower mouth. AS the blood came Heine raught her in his arms. The wave, re ceding, shut the other bathers from view, and for ten seconds the sailorman held the girl close to his heart.
 My lip will swell!' she panted, struggling to free herself.
 But Heine jollied her, just as he jol- lied the commanding officer of the Shark and within half an hour she had checked her surf board and bath ing costume at the bathhouse and was riding back to town with him, holding
 
 Three days later the fleet was ready to sail. Dusky singers with their tiny guitars strummed the sad Aloha Oe" -"Farewell'--in every street. Pearl managed her other admirers so that Heine might have the last evening. When the time came for a final good by Heine told her that he was coming back to Honolulu some day.
 Pearl studied his face; then she pouted.
 That's what they all say!''
 The sailors eyes danced as he kissed her bruised mouth; then he was gone
 This time Pearl did not look for present She would have preferred the sailor back again. But the gift came. ! It was brooch set with a genuine