The Argosy, Vol. XXIV, No. 3 — page 61: what you’re looking at

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

A SECRET OF THE SOUTH PACIFIC, 445 A slight, graceful figure in a flowing white garment sat by his side. One pretty hand rested on the hammock and swayed it back and forth ; the other upheld the face which was turned from him. It did not seem strange that Sydney Latimer should be alive and beside him in the midst of these unfa- miliar scenes. He put out his fingers, surprised to find even such a slight effort wearying, and laid them upon the hand on the hamntock. Sydney sprang to her feet and bent above him, her dark eyes shining like stars. He put his other hand upon her shoulder, and slight though his strength was, drew her nearer. ‘Their lips met. Then she stood upright, shook the hair back from her face and said : ‘Do you know me, Howard ?”’ That was a ridiculous question for a girl to ask a man just after she had kissed him! ‘Thorne told her so afterward; but then he was content to lie there and listen to what she had to say. ‘Vou don’t know where you are, do you?’’ she went on. ‘‘ You have been sick a week—out of your senses, too, you poor boy, most of the time. At first you were going over and over in your mind that awful experience we had together ‘the night of the wreck, and our battle with the tide when we were swept intothe tunnel. Oh, you told a lot I had never suspected before.” She shook her finger at him roguishly. ‘“ Luckily there was nobody but my father and your father to hear it.’’ “My father—your father?’’ repeated Thorne. “Ves; don’t talk and I will tell you. This is the interior of the island. Would you have guessed it? Your father says it was an atoll before it was upheaved. ‘The cliffs surround it on all sides, only in here they are only about fifty feet high and very easily scaled. I have been up there and looked over the whole island. ‘This inner basin contains only five or six square miles, but there are nearly a thousand people living here. They almost wor- ship your father. ““Tsn’t it wonderful? He was wrecked here twenty years ago. His companions died. ‘These natives, who have nothing to do with any of the inhabitants of the other Pacific islands, found him. ‘They have been here for centuries; that is, I mean their ancestors were. The plain is drained through the crevasses in the coral cliff, and when they have occasion to enter or leave this plain they go in canoes through the tunnel at low water. Well, they welcomed your father to thelr villages and he has been here all the time, excepting the few months he was absent on his trip with Jessop to Aukland. He returned from that, determined never to leave again.” ‘But you——’’ began Thorne. “Wait. I will tell you. I was carried right through the tunnel, which is about fifty yards long, and out intothe light again. On this side there is a deep cut or gully that has been carved out by the water running down to the sea level for so many ages. Under your father’s direction that ravine was enlarged and the natives have kept their canoes there, and the old long boat of the Juan Fernandez, anda larger boat they have recently built. I was cast ashore and they found me. ‘That was the first they had known of the wreck of the Naida. COMMGCMOOOKS. CO)