Argosy, Vol. 111, No. 1 — page 117: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

ISLE OF thoughts. There seemed something in com- mon between them, and, as he gazed across the surge of the reef to where the bush- clad hill rose black to the cleft mountain tops, he wondered if she, in the tambu- house, was thinking of him, waiting for him to come to her rescue. He felt that this was so, felt that when they met it would not be as strangers. She was her father’s pal, a girl sea- cradled—sea-bred, loving the same things that he did. No city maiden, delighting in the frivols of dress, of dancing, of the things he knew nothing of. Here was a maid who could stand by the rail on nights like this and understand and share the si- lences, the great spaces, who would love the winds, the stress of mounting seas, the gallant struggle of the ship, the skill of the man who handled it. Could take her trick at the wheel, too, without doubt; pore over charts and map out trails across the unex- ploited seas. To her a drawing-room would be a cabin, the kitchen a galley, her boudoir her own special apartment with its spotless bunk. He went further. He imagined her face, not pale and elfin as it had been in the moonlight, but quaintly vivid, aflame with life and living, looking at him across. the table under the cabin lamp. There might be a real house on Hope Island, or, after the pile was made, on some larger land. He drew a long breath and looked up to the Pleiades, sparkling high above him. The stars were all globes of gold aswim in the ether, not merely spangled on the curtain of the night. And he dismissed the vision. Lenna Parks was an heiress, and he an unproved adventurer. There was still his pearl lagoon. He had only tried one end of it. In the deeper water, twenty fathoms down, beyond the limit of any of his boys’ powers of diving, fortune might still lie. But there was much to do yet. The heat of the day was tempered, but the night was suffocatingly hot. The sea was flaming with luminous atoms. The re- flection of therphosphor in the reef-breakers showed before they spilled their foam on the lagoon. The coral, partly exposed at the ebb, displayed a steady glow of lam- bent flame. It twisted about the sides of DRUMS. 107 the Mbelema in snaky coils of opalescent greens and violets. Back in the bush there was drumming still going on spasmodically as the feast ended. His pipe burned out and he found his pouch empty. It was time to turn in. Sime was sleeping uneasily. McKay looked commiseratingly at the hollow eyes and sunken cheeks. The Californian’s hair was wet with the sweat that covered his forehead, the sheet that covered his naked, wasted body was soaked with the perspira- tion of weakness. McKay shook his head as he picked up a string-hammock from a transom, meaning to swing it on deck be- tween the mainmast and the stays. ‘‘Game as they make ’em,” he com- mented. ‘“ But you’re up against a losing proposition, Fred.”’ Everybody aboard the Mbelema was up betimes the next morning, but no sound came from Motonui, no smokes were seen. The village was sleeping off its gorging like a many-stomached snake. Ponda had shown himself as much a glutton as the rest, and McKay knew there would be little stirring before the hour set for the burning of the sand—at high noon. Faroa, rapidly recovering, begged to be allowed with the shore party, but McKay put him off, hesitating also as he sized up Sime’s condition. ‘I don’t anticipate any especial trouble, Fred,” said McKay, “but if anything should break loose, it’s going to happen soon and travel fast. We may need some brisk action to cover us at this end. Will you take charge of the schooner to-day and boss the—” “Tl boss nothing,” replied Sime. ‘ You are the boss, and I’m just a sniper. But I’m going where there are snipes, and you can lay to that. It’s another rotten day, and you figure I can’t stand the heat, so you 'ré trying to kid me to stick on the boat. Nothin’ doin’, Mac. Call it mutiny, if you want to. Me and my little gats walk right along with you. We ain’t goin’ off till six bells, anyway. The worst part of the day ’Il be over by then. While you’re doin’ your Salamanderino stuff, pull it off somewhere near a shady tree, and I'll be much obliged to you—but I’m goin’ along.” cComicloool CO