Five Mile Beach weekly journal., 1917-02-09

~tinually for the slightest hint of rebel
lion. Early the next morning when
she coeoanuts began to arrive On the
big bamboo RATS | noted with a grin
Of satisfaction that all hands set to
work packing them into the hold with
an ~alacrity which they had never be-
fore manifested IN my service.
Taking on cargo occupied a week,
and during that time | neve left the
ships deck farther than the cabin.
The following evening we put out to
sea, the men working like demons to
get away before night shut down,
Shackleford laughing all the while ut
their eagerness to be rid of what he
declared to be 1.-The finest spot east of
Suez." His Chinamen-I shall new
forget that last glimpse Of them.
~squatted upon the empty bamboo RATS,
their cues wound about their I'M
shaved heads, the sweat still stream
ing down their naked bodies to the
fiimsy cotton pantaloons corded about
their waists, and viewed our departure
out of their narrow eyes with features
as impassive as those of a stone Bud
dha. What did they know about the
two rusty hulks, the gray thing that
haunted them, and what had they told
my crew? l wondered. Worn out with
a trying week, | turned In.
A shock hurled me from my berth,
and as | CROPPED about in the darkness
for the key of the door the sound Of
crashing timber and of branches trail
ing across the cabin window made me
guess my surroundings. Springing on
deck, l turned instinctively to the
wheel, and there, bowed owe it like
an old man and c%lutching the spokes
with hairy hands, was a huge gray
ape-the very monster Shackleford and
l had failed to bring down the night of
the raid upon the %cocoanut grove!
At sight of me it r~elinquished its
hold upon the wheel and sprang at
me, barring its teeth in sudden rage.
Whipping out my pistol, | began to fire
and back away and brought it down
with a shot in its gaping mouth just
as it was reaching out its horrible
corded arms to seize me. AS it col
lapsed with a gasping shudder at my
very feet l sprang backward from sheer
repulsion and in doing so fell into the
lagoon through a hole in the railing
that the thick branch of a tree had
carried away.
Not till then did the full Significance
of what had transpired dawn upon
c,1~, t1oro x-oc nnno hr1t onnc
from the surrounding trees and the
two rusty hulks that had so puzzled
me and that now lay on either side
came swarming upon the steamer
till they covered everything-winches.
forecastle head, the empty davits, the
spare anchors, the very rigging-with
a gray, writing mass that struggled
and fought and screamed in a wild
rush for the cocoanuts, which could
easily be reached through the main
hatch, left open to prevent ~overheat1ng.
Swimming round to the rudder, now
completely out of water above the mad
ly racing screw, l climbed up beyond
the reach of sharks and listened to
the appalling pandemonium till the
last must have been remove
from the hold, when the brutes grad
ually dispersed through the forest.
Afraid to venture back on deck,
at daylight l mounted a piece of the
round house that had been swept over
board and made my way on the in
coming tide up the channel which led
to the plantation. On the edge of the
grove l paused in ~incredulous Wonder,
and then the truth came home to me.
Under a fierce attack of the apes the
wire fence had at last given way,
and the cocoanut grove was in ruins.
Shackleford's bungalow | found IN a
state of pillage Sc complete that only
the our upright posts remained, and
the fimsy huts occupied by the Chi
nese laborers were scattered about as
if struck by a typhoon.
Not far from the ruins l found
Shackleford's beautifully stained meer-
schaum pipe trampled into the earth
by a host of passing feet, M protrud-
ing from under a tattered
leaf was a Chinaman's cue, streaked
WILL gray DuI AO OClSohA0
cred end. Prepared for the worst, l
was Fastening down the newly beaten
path toward the jungle when a groan
to my left attracted my attention, and,
rushing over, l found Shackleford and
his Cinnamon neatly trapped under the
barbed wire fence.
"You see," Shackleford explained
when had pried up the edge of the
deadly netting, which they were I'M
able to raise with their bare hands be-
cause of the incl long barbs, eve were
poking the bally brutes off the fence
with sharpened bamboos and having
no end of fun when their weight
doubled the whole thing over and shut
us into as fine a little fort as a fellow
could wish for. Ha, ha!'
Shackleford, followed by a score OF
~bedraggled Cinnamon, crawled out
80 go II. s-1I,rAa ,,r ht1t lt10lyu