JAVA JACK.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXII, Issue 19061, 4 July 1925, Page 5 (Supplement)

JAVA JACK.

BY" OTTWELL BINNS. Author of " A Mating in the Wilds," " Tho Troasuro of Christophe," " Clancy of tho Mounted Police," etc, etc. (Copyright.) CHAPTER X. Out of the darkness that haj overtaken him Andy Callaghan awoke to find himself lying on a strip of sand with his sister by his side. The wind had blown • tself out, and thought tho seas were still thunderous the air was quite still and v.ho sun was shining. As he opened his eyes Nora Callaghan gave a heartfelt cry. "Thank God! Oh, thank God!" He made as if to sit up, but overcome by sudden dizziness fell back again. " Don't niovo yet, Andy," implored the girl. " Y'ou'vo had a bad knock on the fiead from a rock, 1 think." At that ho recalled the floating'thing which had struck him, and answered: " No! It wasn't a rock. It was . , . sonio blame thing in the water." He turned his head sideways and saw tho man Blake tending a fire which had been lit upon the beach. There was no one else in sight, and as ho realised that they were alone a troubled look came in his eyes. "Java?" ho asked. "Where—" " We've seen nothing of him," answered his sister in a quivering voice. " Gone ? " I'm afraid so." There was still tho same quiver in her voice, and her beautiful face was worked with emotion. Then she added: "Blake s,%s wo had great luck to escape." " cs ; " ' lo rc i>licd, and after a moments silence said: " Help mo up, Nora." I think I had better not. Y r our head—" "Bunk! It won't improve any lying here in the sun. There's a rock there Set me against it. Blake will help you." Jho girl called out to Blake, and between them they assisted him to the rock he had indicated. There for a minute he siit with closed eyes and a face the colour of chalk. His sister watching him cried out in alarm. "It's nothing," ho said ? opening his eyes. "I just ielt, mortal sick and dizzy, that's all." "Bit o' concussion, I expect," commented Blake. "I was that way myself once when a fellow sandbagged me down li'arbary way, 'Frisco. Better keep still a bit, that's the best thing—that an' no talk. Mo and Miss Callaghan here'll man-

ago things all right, I'reckon, if you'll shut vo'r peepers an' go to sleep a bit, Callaghan shut his eyes less with tho idea of going to sleep than to exclude tho shimmering light, and a minute later heard his sister and Blake move quietly away. Then he opened them again and looked round. Tho seas still broke in foam upon the beivch where he reposed, and thundered on a long reef of rocks away to tho right, breaking into fino spray of which the strong sunlight made miniature rainbows. He stared at it thoughtfully for a little while. Since there was no other in.sight, that would bo the reef on which the Van Tromp had crashed, and from end to end he surveyed it, without however finding any sign of the wrecked vessel. His eyes turned to the shore and again drew a blank. There \vas various flotsam strewn about which might or might, not have been part of the equipment of the wreck, but of tho latter itself nothing was visible. Apparently it was quite lost.

He next gave Ins attention to the island itself. In the direction of the reef there was a high cliff of coralline rock crowned with vegetation of the most brilliant green, while in the opposite direction was another white cliff not so high, but as luxuriantly verdured. Behind him, so far as he could make out, the cliffs were lower, and from the glimpses that lie could get of them without standing up, they appeared to bo almost completely covered with flowerbearing creepers. Having noted the configuration of the shoro he once more turned his eyes seaward, where a great flock of gulls wero screaming harshly around something that drifted in the sea. What it was he Could not tell, but that it was something that offered forage to these scavengers of the seas he could guess. As he watched a frown puckered his forehead, and ho gave a little shudder as lie reflected that it might well bo the borly of a drowned man. Then a flight of brilliantly-hued pigeons caught his eyes, and as he followed them into the wood at the far end of the little bay, the noisy shrieks of parrots came from the bosky recesses behind him. Whatever this island was it was certainly not a desert so far as birdlife was concerned, and there would be no fear of his companions and himself starving if they could devise some means of snaring the winged creatures that abounded.

Then a look of melancholy came on his lean face, and ho whispered to himself: "Poor old Java! If onlv ho had "

A heavy stop broke on his whisper and he half turned to find Blake approaching him with a green cocoa-nut in his hand, the top of which had been sliced off. "Drink this, sir. It'll do yo' no ond of good. An' if yo'll scrape out the pulp an* eat it, you'll find it won't come amiss."

He took the offered nut, emptied it at a draught, and then looked at the sailor. "Where did you get it, Blake?" ' Back o' that bluff there. There's scores o' palms, an' the wind last night made havoc among the nuts. We ain't going to go hungry yet awhile, for they must have fair rained down." Callaghan nodded, then asked: "Whero do you suppose we are, Blake ?" "Lor' knows!" answered the sailor with a short laugh. "Yesterday before that howler began wo were two hundred miles south of Oram. 1 saw Java mark it on the chart, but where we. are now ain't to be even guessed at, though I reckon wo ain't far from the place wo were making for." "And for all tho good that can do us wo might be in Peru. We're tied here by the leg till some ship comes this way." "Ship!" Blake laughed harshly. "Ten to one this is one o' them god-forsaken places where ships don't come. It don't look any sort o' likely place even for a trader. But when we've had some sort of a breakfast I'm going to the top that way to take a look round." He pointed in the opposito direction from the reef as he spoke, and stood looking thoughtfully without adding anything to what he had said. Then Andy Callaghan asked another question, "Do you think there's any chance that Java has escaped ?" "Who's to say ? I know Java. If Cod A'mighty gave him half a chance he's breathin' and kickiri' somewhere, I'll lay, for lie ain't one o' those fellers that squeals an' gives up the game because it's going badly against him. I've known him como out of some damn tight corners where other fellers 'ud have gone under. Yo' an' me an' missy there came out of that 'ell las' night, an' why not Java, who had more life in him than any man I ever met?" I wish I could think he was safe, but " He broke off and his eyes sought the clamouring gulls. Blake followed his gaze and understood the unspoken thought. " Yo're tbinkin' he's gull-meat? Well he ain't! I got it in my bones that he ain't, though tho Lord knows where he's put himself." The sailor turned abruptly away and began to walk along tho beach as if searching for wreckage, and presently Andy Callaghan saw him stoop, then lie flat on the beach. After a minute or two lie stood upright, and the watcher caught the flash of a knife in the strong sunlight. Then the man dropped on tho sand again, apparently grubbing for something, and a little time later began to return carrying something in his hands. "Eggs!" he explained tersely. "Fresh as paint. Cuess we'll feed all right this morning. . . . There's monkeys back thorc too. 1 heard 'em chattcrin' in the wood—

an' there's worse victuals in the world than roast monkey." He laughed as he made this remark, then gave himself to the serious preparation of breakfast; while Callaghan still watched the screaming gulls at their carrion me&l. Breakfast over, Blake started on his exploration of the island in the direction of the. smaller cliff, and while Nora Callaghau walked along the edge of the falling tide, on the look out for anything of value that might havo drifted ashore, her brother watched the sailor as he. progressed along the beach, stopping now and again to retrieve something from the water. Blake's progress was slow enough, but presently he. reached the foot of the cliff, followed the base of it for a little way and disappeared from sight. Callaghan watched the edpo of the wood on the cliff-top thinking that ho would reappear there, but watched in vain; then sudden and startlingly clear came a yell. Nora Callaghan, some distance down the beach, caught the sound, and for a moment stood as if turned to stone; then began to run in the direction of her brother. The latter with a great effoit lifted himself to his feet, and with one hand on the rock to support him, stood swaying, while ho watched sea and sky and beach and cliffs go round in a mad grotesque, lint after a moment the dizziness passed, and though ho was conscious of a feeling of nausea, his vision became cleai; and steady, and he looked on a world that had its normal aspect.

" You heard " cried his sister breathlessly. "Oh, what was it Andy?"

"Don't know!" ho answered tersely. " Either Blake's hit against trouble or he's found something." " But "

Whatever Nora Callaghan had been about to say went uncompleted. She stared in the. direction which the sailor had taken, with a look upon her face as of one who listens. But no further sound came from tho verdure-crowned cliff, and only the screaming of the gulls from the sea and the shrieking of parrots in the woods behind broke tho monotonous rumble of the waters. Then .she looked with troubled eyes at her brother. " Andv, something has happened to Blake." "

" Seems so," he answered. We've got to find out. Lend mo an arm; I'm still rocky on my pins." Arm in arm they began to move down the strip of beach, neither speaking, but both watching the cliff ahead in hope of seeing Blake reappear. They had traversed perhaps half the distanco which lay between them and the noint where the sailor had disappeared, when another yell broke from the wood ahead, and from between the trees tho man for whom they wore so anxious appeared, and behind him a second figure carrying something in his arms. (To b» continued daily.)