Part 4 (2/2)
”I have not,” said Marteau in the tone of lugubrious triu in the world that could have pleased him quite so much as this chance to prove Captain Jean the loser on a venture ”We are too late
Bad luck, bad luck--that calm What misfortune! They are all dead!”
”Will you mind your business?” shouted the skipper
”But still, the gentlemen are dead--”
”What is zat toto feed”
”But how--”
”Hogsheads, sheads in the afterhold Fill the drawn all possible satisfaction fro the nub of his joke with a grin ”Ze gentlee is all paid, Marteau Before we left Sydney, Marteau I contrac' to bring back three escape' convicts, and so by 'ell I do--in pickle! And now if you'll kindly get zose passengers aboard like I said an' bozzer less about ze Goddareen on my eye, Marteau, and you can dam' well smoke it!”
Marteau recovered hi detail ”There is a fourth man on board that raft, Captain Jean He is a Canaque--still alive What shall we do with him?”
”A Canaque?” snapped Captain Jean ”A Canaque! I had no word in my contrac' about any Canaque Leave hier He'll do well enough where he is”
And Captain Jean was right, perfectly right, for while the _Petite Suzanne_ was taking aboard her grisly cargo the wind freshened fro away for Australia the ”daer” spread his own sail of pandanus leaves and twirled his own helm of niaouli wood and headed the cata somewhat dry after his exertion, he plucked at random fro hith in his accustomed place at the stern, he thrust the reed down into one of the bladders underneath and drank his fill of sater
He had a dozen such storage bladders re, built into the floats at intervals above the water line--quite enough to last hiram--Metro Picture_
_Where the Pavement Ends_
A SCENE FROM THE PHOTOPLAY]
THE LOST God
Prophets have cried out in print, no , and saints have been known to write their autobiographies, and even angels are credited now and then with revealing rammatical But I have seen the diary of an authentic God who once went to and fro on the earth and in the waters underneath
His record is the Book of Jie Bay, which is Papua, which is the end of the back of beyond and a bit farther yet; the great, dark, and sripped as a conqueror, where anything can happen that you would care to believe and ht it hi to claim it are apparently reer than truth anyhow, and pays better So I shall feel quite safe infree of that remarkable work, just as Jim Albro set it doith a leaden bullet on some strips of bark and left it for those who came after to find
In his very blackest hour Jim Albro must have known that somebody would come after him, some time Somebody always did come after him, no ht lead He was that kind All his days he never lacked the friend to hunt him up and to pack him home when he was helpless, to pay his bills or to bail him out at need One of those irresistible rascals born to a soft place near the world's heart, whose worst follies serve only to endear them, whose wildest errors are accepted as the o on serenely drawing blank checks against destiny!
It is odd that he should have had to settle up in the end unaided, cut off from all help, completely isolated--and yet with the savor of popular ad about him, amid the continued applause of a multitude
”A chap like Albro can't siht,” said Cap'n Bartlet, thoughtfully ”He's filled too h too many scrapes He's had his way too often withthe rail on the after-deck of the little _Aurora Bird_, as she began to grope her passage through the barrier reef, a silent lot Talk had been cheap enough on the long stretch up the Coral Sea, when every possible theory of Albro's fate, and the fate of his three white shi+pmates and their native crew, had been thrashed to weariness But now suspense held us all by the throat, for ere co-off place
And so else held us--I could call it a spell and not be so far wrong The lazy airs offshore bore down to us the scent that is like nothing else in the world, of rotting jungle and teereen, and rare, sleepy blossoms, heavy with death and ardent with a fierce vitality This is the breath of Papua, stirring war and desire can ever forget Many old hunters, and eagerly have sought to know uarding her secrets still behind her savage coasts and the fringe of her untracked forests--the black sphinx of the seas, lovely, vast, and cruel