ooked through the serried vista of the
palm trunks which showed white and ghostly in the darkness.

"Aye," said Jim, "she is. I'll give her a call."

Just beside the doorway lay a huge conch shell, such as is used by the
people of the Equatorial islands either as a summons to assemble or a
call to one person only, and the stalwart young half-caste, taking it
up, placed the perforated end to his lips and blew a loud, booming note.

A wild clamour of alarm answered the call, and a swarm of noddies and
terns, roosting in countless thousands among a thicket of pandanus palms
near by, slid from their perches, and with frightened croak and flapping
wing whirled and circled around the trader's house, then vanished in the
darkness ere the echoes of the conch had died away.

"That'll bring her, Jim," said the old man, turning to the lamp and
pricking up the wick with his knife.

Silent Jim nodded.

"Yes, she's comin' now. I can hear her runnin'."

They heard her footsteps over the dead palm branches which strewed the
path, and in a few seconds more, with a gasping sob of terror, the
girl sprang into the room and almost fell at her brother's feet as she
clasped her arms around his neck.

"Ha!" and old Swain, seizing a loaded musket from a number that stood
in a corner of the room, stepped to the door. "Jus' what I thought would
happen one of these days. Some o' them flash native bucks from the south
end has been frightenin' o' her. Quick, Em, who was it?"

For a moment or so the exhausted girl strove to speak in vain, but at
last she found her voice.

"No, father, no. But Jim, Jim, it is you they want! Come, Jim, quick,
quick! They very close now."

"What in thunder are you talkin' 'bout, Em? An' who wants Jim?" And then,
turning to his son, he asked, "Have you been a-thumpin' any o' those
south-end natives lately, Jim?"

"No, no," said the girl, rising to her feet, and endeavouring to speak
calmly; "you don' know, father. But Jim must go, an' you an' me mus'
stay here. Quick, quick, for God's sake, dear, go out at the back an'
cross to the windwar' side. Plenty place there for you to hide, Jim, for
two or tree day."

A savage light came into the half-caste's eyes, as with an abrupt yet
tender gesture he placed his huge brown hand on his sister's curly
head; then, without a word, he seized a musket and cutlass, and with a
farewell wave of his hand to the wondering old man, opened the door at
the back of the house