On the fifth day it became known that the Shan-Shan syndicate of
Cantonese had a remaining case of _toendstikkers_. They claimed
that until now they had overlooked this case. It held a hundred
packages, or twelve hundred boxes. It was priceless as the sole
possible barrier against the absolute ending of the game.

The Shan-Shan people were without heart. They demanded for the case
five francs a packet. Many of the younger Marquesans counselled
giving the Cantonese a taste of the ancient _u'u_, the war-club of a
previous generation. Desperate as was the plight of the older
gamesters, they dared not consent. The governor would return, the
law would take its course, and they would go to Noumea to work out
their lives for crime. No, they would buy the case for francs, but
they would not risk dividing it among many, who would be devoured
piecemeal by the diabolical O Lalala.

"Kivi, the Vagabond, the Drinker of _kava_, is the chief to lead our
cause," said Great Fern. "He has never gone to the Christian church.
He believes still in the old gods of the High Place, and he is
tattooed with the shark."

Kivi was the one man who had not played. He cared nothing for the
pleasures of the _Farani_, the foolish whites. After palaver, his
neighbors waited on him in a body. They reasoned with him, they
begged him. He consented to their plan only after they had wept at
their humbling. Then they began to instruct him.

They told him of the different kinds of combinations, of straights
and of flushes, and of a certain occasional period when the Tahitian
would introduce a mad novelty by which the cards with one fruit on