The Richfield recorder. (Richfield, Idaho) 1909-1931, 1909-06-03

to fragments and not a few of tn
! Walkers themselves into a land as un
charted as their own. She had tried .
! beach comber for murder and haC
dangled him at the main yard arm
giving him later on a Church of Eng
land service, a hammock and the use
of cannon ball at his feet. She hac
poked her nose into cannbal BAYS
where women of wild beauty and wild
er license swan off to the ship In hun
dreds until the marines drove them
back with muskets and fired at their
own comrades, who, In their madness,
leaped after them into the water She
had lain for weeks in enormous atolls,
where the only life was that of birds
and the silence was unbroken save for
the long roll of the surf and at night
the ghostly scurrying of turtles over
the sand. She had been everywhere In
those labyrinthian seas, those haunts
OF romance and mystery, with love-
danger and death always close aboard.
1t was morning when Hadow raised
the island, a fieecy speck of cloud
against the sky line, and he shortened
sail at once and fingered out the day
so as to bring him up to it by dark.
After supper every light on board was
doused, and the great hull, gliding
through the glass smooth water, merg-
ed her steep sides and towering yards
and canvas into the universal shadow.
With whispering keel and wind so
fair and soft that one wondered to
see the sails stiffen in the bolt ropes.
the man-of-war stole steadily to lee
ward, with no sound but the occa-
sional creak of cordage or the hoarse
murmur of voices from the lower deck.
BY 10 the ship was hove to close
ashore, AID the lights of the little set
Element glimmered through the palms.
The warm night, laden with exotic !
fragrance and strangely exciting in the |
Intensity of its stiffness and beauty, (
hid beneath its far reaching pail the /
various actors of an extraordinary
drama. With pistols bucl1led to their
hips, Brady, Winterslea, Hotham and
Stanbury-J four officers of the
ship, together with Hatch, a finty
faced old seaman who could be trusted.
all slipped down the ladder into the
captains gig and pulled with mufiled
oars for the break in the reef. Picking
their way through the pass, with the
surf on either hand roaring in their
ears, they slowly penetrated the lagoon
and headed for the kings house. The
shelving beach brought them to a stop,
and all jumping out TO tighten the boat :
they drew her over the single and
made her painter fast to a pandanus
rec. Then, acting in accordance with
preconcerted plan, Winterslea was ,
tent forward to track down their prey,
while the rest huddled together to
wait his return. :.
Ten minutes, twenty minutes, pass :
ID in palpitating suspense. A girl drew :
" wreathed in flowers. She looked 7
ut to sea, then up at the stars and .
hrank again into the shadow. From
be neighboring houses there came the
ound of mellow voices and of laugh A
or. A pig rooted and rustled among :,
heap of cOc0anut Shells Half an !
our passed, and from far across the
'ater, as faint and silvery as some
the time-six bells. n
Painting and crouching, Winterslea T,
,oped his way among them. -
Gomez he said.
They followed him in silence, I'M in
osing their holsters and grimly ready. FIR
pair of handouts clinked in Hatch's or
mper.
WintersIea, with keen perception, led Fl
e way like hound, skirting lighted
uses and following devious inland co
this. The comparative openness of
e village began to give way to the
mixer underground of the plantations mn
hind 1t. The path sank into a chok- no
vegetation that stood on either 90
lie and brushed their faces as they N.
lowed in single file. A fallen tree ca,
We them the passage of a stream. cri
'Therew said Winterslea. 40
rhe path opened out on little clear ma
: among the trees and showed them, on,
on high, the outlines of a native oot
Use. Like all Tahitian houses. it for
s on the model of a bird cage, and ker
oval wall of bamboo, set side by bis
e, let through vertical streaks of in
1T from the lamp or fire within. 90
the whole party drew nearer they Pr.
nd, deep below them on the other con
2, the pleasant sound of falling wa %
and realized that the cliff they inc
re mounting overlooked a little riv- ton
at its foot. Here in exquisite Sc onI
, non SacA oarraru nao CHOSEN the dea
for his moral suicide A
Keeping up to the house and look 7,
through 1le cracKs OF the Dam froI
S, bis comrades saw him sitting "a
hin, dressed like a native in tapa f,l
h, with bare chest and flowers in Cha
tawny hair He was sitting in a 8
mock, and with her head against shol
knee a beautiful girl was looking moss
into his face, one hand locked in hon
ther
that land of pretty women she IT
the one that outshone them all at
ga, the sister of the king, for whose an
= IaVor every man on board had said
Inf in vain And bora che xrvoc