Part 7 (1/2)
”A diver's pipe,” he repeated ”A diver, d'you see? They had a diver, and--according to your notions, Peters--” He drew a slow breath
”What--what if that there diver _did_ happen to be overboard at the minute the rush came?”
And then ca: ”Soe on the box”
As we span around he turned it over atilt, so that all ht see the bold letters, scarred in lead, of that laconic legend--all but Bartlet, who fumbled for his spectacles ”Writ with a Snider bullet, I take it,”
continued the trader ”One of them soft-nosed kind as supplied to heathen parts for a blessin' of civilization”
”Read it, can't you?” begged the cap'n
And this was the notice Jeckol read:
The Crew of the Schooner _Timothy S_ of Cooktown that tried a cast with fortune and turned a deuce Barange Bay, Jan 22, 19--
J MULLHALL, _master_ BAMBA, KOHO B SMYTHE, _mate_ KAKWE, JACK-JACK HENRY NEW MENOMI, FRANK
_Hic finis fandi_
Cap'n Bartlet removed his hat and wiped away a steam of sith deliberate care and a red-barred kerchief ”Sounds natural,” he observed, clearing his throat ”Though I never did e”
”Itof the kind,” explained Jeckol ”But still,” he added, quite seriously, ”the list isn't complete, you know Where's your friend Albro?”
Peters rolled the white of an eye on hiers run much to writin' epitaphs? Or books--?”
He held up to our gaze the object he had found on lifting the lid of the box--a packet of thin bark strips covered with coarse s and bound with a twist of fiber which next he unknotted, to run the leaves over in his hand ”I kneas alive,” said Cap'n Bartlett simply
And that was the on to the story of Jahnessy Albro
Even now I can recall each tone and gesture of its telling, each detail of the group we e; the trader's drawl and check as he read a line or turned to Kakith a question or flung in some vivid comment of his own; the strained attention on Bartlet's earnest face; incredulous sniff and squint of little Jeckol, still unsubdued, fidgeting about; the statued bronze figures of our Tonga boys as they stood leaning patiently on their rifles, awaiting the le; the odd, high-peaked houses with their cavernous fronts like gaping and grinning listeners; the lances of sunlight that began to splinter and fall out ah all and over all the heat and the s, o wealth I found glory I went below as an amateur diver and I came up a professional God But I wish I could find which son of a nighthawk it was that cut my pipe I'd excoe from the Book of Jim Albro, and it shows him as he lived
Later entries are not so clear, not by any h in all truth It n, while he was still in the flush of his stupendous adventure, before he had begun to understand what lay ahead But here was the lass marble,” that ”never held his fist or his smile” No other could have written it after the events he had survived
Just as Peters inferred to have been the case, the attack on the _Tiht the whole crew of pearl hunters unready They had seen no natives at Barange, they kept no lookout, and when Albro stepped off the ladder thatof January 22 he left his shi+pmates contentedly eht have been a different matter--any part of them He went down to the shell bed, and while he was there the black raiders es took the diving lines for an extrawhatever about the apparatus--and Albro's first warning was the cutting of that air pipe, when he found his pressure gone and water trickling through the inlet valve Fortunately, he was just preparing to ascend and had tightened his outlet to inflate the suit Fortunately, too, his helmet was furnished with an adjustable inlet and he was able hastily to close both valves
He tugged at his life line, but it drew loose in his hand He turned over on his side to look upward, but he could see nothing--only the vague blue twilight through which the slack coils of his severed air pipe ca Then he knew that he had been cut off, and the hideous fear that lies in wait for every diver, amid the perils and loneliness of the sea bottoht have popped to the surface by throwing off his forty-pound weights, but he are that no chance accident could have served hiet away, from schooner and all, to shore Under water he had so as the inclosed air should last hi to ablindly to slash free the useless pipe he lost his diver's knife
The rotten coral burst and sank under footing Clogging weeds enwreathed and held him back with evil embrace A tridacna spread its jaws before his steps so that he nearly plunged into the deadly springtrap of the deep But he kept on up the slope; his keen spirit rallied and bore hi from the waves at last on a point of rocks outside the bay where he could cling and open the eency cock in the helmet The suit deflated and he breathed new life But here he suffered his second immediate mishap, for as he scrambled to his feet a dizziness took hireat clang of ar at the very threshold of his world
_Broke left arers They dropped on their faces, and I saas elected_